5 mobile apps that can recognize indoor plants

1. Google Lens

Identify Houseplant Species Using Google Lens

The most obvious way to search for unknown plants is to use Google. Basically, you can just take a picture of a flower and upload the picture to the Google Images service and see what the search engine can find.

But it will be much faster to search by photo through Google Lens. This application has a special mode for recognizing plants and animal breeds - that's what we need.

Point the smartphone camera at an object and when a colored circle appears on the screen, click on it. Google will find similar options on the web, and if you're lucky, you'll find out the name.

Google Lens does not always correctly recognize rare plants, but its capabilities will be enough to search for common species.

2. PlantNet

Identify houseplant species with PlantNet

This popular plant guessing app is created by the community of French botanical organizations. According to the developers, PlantNet is best at handling wild species. But, as experiments have shown, it recognizes house plants well.

Click on the button in the lower right corner of the screen, select an image from the gallery or take a picture from the camera, and then indicate which part of the plant you photographed - a flower, leaf, fruit or trunk. PlantNet will display a list of similar objects, help you find the Latin name of your pet and offer to search for it in Google or Wikipedia.

The PlantNet base is replenished by users. Participation in the project is optional, but if you wish, you can create an account and mark correctly guessed flowers to improve recognition accuracy. A separate plus of this application is that it is completely free and does not have premium features.

3.iNaturalist

Identify houseplant species with iNaturalist

Another application similar to PlantNet. Developed by scientists at the University of California, Berkeley. It can recognize plants, insects, animals and birds. Mainly designed for work in the field, but also copes with indoor plants.

Take a photo of the indoor flower, then click on the "View offers" button. The program will display the most likely variants of its name. If the plant is identified correctly, you can upload it to the database and provide a description to help other users.

The app is free and has no restrictions. True, it does not recognize rare species very well, but it is still worth a try.

4. PlantSnap

Identify Houseplant Species with PlantSnap

A slightly more advanced program with a large database containing flowers, trees, mushrooms, succulents and cacti from all over the world. We take a picture, wait a second - and the object is recognized.

Using machine learning and AI technology, PlantSnap is equally good at detecting plants in nature and those that live on the windowsill. Upon recognizing the flower, PlantSnap displays a short description of it.

PlantSnap can be tried without additional investment on Android, but you have to pay on iOS. In the free version, you will not be able to upload more than 10 images per day - and this is quite small, given that the program does not always recognize plants the first time. For $ 2.99 a month, the restrictions will be lifted.

5. PictureThis

Identify houseplant species with PictureThis

PictureThis has a hefty database of indoor plants and identifies them fairly accurately. The program not only serves to identify flowers, but also serves as a kind of social network for gardeners from all over the world.

Even if PictureThis cannot guess what kind of plant you photographed, the picture should be uploaded to the database, marking it as unknown. And, if any of the indoor plant lovers knows the name of your flower, he can sign it.

Keep in mind that it is better to photograph the flower or leaves in close-up, rather than photographing the entire bush. The free version of PictureThis will allow you to identify no more than 10 plants per day. For a small collection of indoor flowers, this is enough. If you want to remove the restrictions, you will need to buy a subscription for $ 1.99 per month.

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