As there are 1000s of species of plants, remembering the name and details of each plant is not possible for a human being. Although you can get information on plants from an encyclopedia book, you’ll have to go through several pages of the book to find a specific plant by its picture or leaf. Students and researchers can save time by using a plant identification app on their mobile phones.
Now let’s talk about trekking, an adventurous but dangerous sport. Most people put the first aid box in their rucksack before leaving the house. Some people forget to do so. People who go trekking often hurt themselves. Insects or reptiles may also bite them. If a person is injured or has contracted a bacterial or viral infection, he must find plants with medicinal properties. The plant identification apps will help users in recognizing such plants. Here are the best plant identifier apps for Android and iPhone:
PictureThis: Identify Plant, Flower, Weed and More
PictureThis is a free app that identifies plants and flowers displayed in a picture accurately. It has 50K users. The main interface of PictureThis displays two buttons – take a new picture and select an image from the phone gallery. Tap the 1st button if the plant is right in front of you. Tap the 2nd button if you’re mesmerized by the picture of a flower, tree, or sapling, and you want to know its name. When you select an image or take a new photo with your phone, PT will scan/analyze the image and get the plant’s details from its database.
PictureThis displays the images you’ve uploaded in its observation interface. It allows other users to comment on the picture. The app enables users to delete the picture from the server. The option for the same is located in the app’s profile section. PictureThis detects the user’s location and displays plants they have discovered on a Google Map. It is one of the best apps to identify plants and trees.
PlantNet Plant Identification
PlantNet has 1+ million users. It is a social network for tree lovers and a great tool to identify plants. It allows users to explore and discover plant species by country. As in PictureThis, PN requires an internet connection to work. To get details of a plant or a tree with PlantNet, users must take a picture of the tree or plant with the app or select its image from the phone’s storage memory. Before scanning the picture, PN prompts users to choose the part of the plant visible in the captured image. For example, choose the flower option if you have taken a flower’s picture.
PN displays the following parts on the screen – seed, flower, fruit, stem, leaf. Once you select the part, PN uploads the image to its server and analyzes it. If the image matches any of the records in the database, PN will fetch the details of the plant from the database and displays the same to the user. If the app fails to identify the plant, you can ask other users to help you out. PN enables logged-in users to like or dislike the pictures.
Although it has more users than PictureThis, the PN’s image recognition algorithm is not great. The plant identification app failed to recognize the shrub visible in a photo I captured with my phone’s camera. PictureThis identified the shrub correctly.
Also check: Best Android photo editing apps
Plantix – your crop doctor
If plants in your garden or farm are infected by bacteria or viruses, you can identify the disease and find a cure for it with the Plantix Android app. Plantix can scan fruits, crops, vegetables online and recommend a pesticide that you can use to treat the disease. If the app gives a clean chit to the image and you still suspect that the plant is infected by a disease, you can ask the community members to review the picture. To do so, you must create a new forum post.
Plantix enables you to see your area’s weather, precipitation, and wind information. It has a library section where you’ll find the list of plant diseases. To get detailed information on the condition and see its cure, tap on the disease name. Plantix ships a search tool. It supports several languages. It is one of the best apps to identify plant diseases.
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Google Lens
Google Lens is a free application that helps users in identifying the objects near them. It is powered by the Google reverse image search technology and is accurate. It is lightweight, fast, and has a simple user interface. Google Lens opens the phone’s camera when you run it. When you take a picture with the camera, Lens tries to identify the thing displayed in the image and shows the results on the screen. GL can scan the images saved on the phone. It provides an option to crop the picture and turn on the led flash module of the phone.
The Lens feature is integrated into the Google Photos application for Android and iOS. Google has also launched a dedicated Lens app on the Play Store. The company has not published Google Lens on iTunes yet. Because of its powerful image recognition capabilities, Google Lens is one of the best plant identification apps for Android.
Flora Incognita – automated plant identification
Flora Incognita is a free application published on the Play Store and iTunes by a Germany-based research university. When you run Incognita for the first time, the application asks you to register an account. It also displays an option to skip the registration step. If you choose the skip option or register and log in to your account, Flora Incognita will display the following three options and a menu icon:
Identify Plant: To use this feature, you should register an account or tap the “use app as a guest” option. When you do so, Flora Incognita will prompt you to enable “Camera Access Permission” for it. Once you grant this permission to the app, you can identify plants with it.
Specifies List: FI gives you access to the details of 4000+ plant species. If you want to get information on your favorite plant, tap this option.
My Observations: This interface displays the plants you’ve identified with the app.
FI uses your location data to find the plant species in your city or country. It supports multiple languages and can display the species name in the user’s native language. FI is one of the best free apps to identify plants and weeds.
Garden Tags – Plants & gardens
Garden Tags requires account registration, and it has an attractive interface. You can use this free app to get caring tips, interact with other users, discover new species, and identify unknown plants, flowers, trees, etc.
How to use the Garden Tags plant identification app?
Users must take pictures of the plant with their mobile devices. The app will not analyze or scan the photo. It will ask you to share the image with the community members or with friends on Facebook/Twitter. Garden Tags allows users to tag a question with the image. It links the pictures you’ve taken with your phone to your profile. It allows you to follow other users and comment on the pictures you’ve uploaded.
Similar top-rated apps to identify plants:
Final thoughts: If you’re looking for free apps to identify plants, trees, weeds, and flowers, use one of the applications I’ve shared above.
I used PictureThis last year, but since the app is not free anymore I was looking for an alternative. I tried PlantNet on various images, but identifications were often not helpful. I’m still looking for an alternative and Flora Incognita on the app store yesterday. Do you have any experience with it? It seems to work quite nicely on a first glance.
Hi, Flora Incognita is an App for automated plant identification. It is focused on the German flora (2700 species) but the team will extend the species list in the next weeks (they will also adapt the species profile) and make the identification workflow easier. Since it’s a research project the app is for free. You should try the app.
The Picture This app is only free for one week. I wanted to try it but it seems to be asking for commitment to pay before you try the app
I too wish I could talk to the company. I purchased a 1 year subscription for $19.95 but it renewed for $29.95 in less than a year. I like the app and would renew but I want to see options.
If anybody knows how, please reply.
PictureThis requires a $29.99/year membership
Best all in one I phone app that identifies plants including flowers,fruit,veggies,trees, shrubs, seeds, insects, diseases, pests and how to treat.
Does one exist or would I need several?