# iNaturalist Updates for March 2026 **URL:** \ **Category:** News and Updates\ **Tags:** web, seek, monthly-update, mobile-app\ **Created:** [April 15, 2026, 10:36pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845 "2026-04-15T22:36:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![tiwane](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/tiwane/32/54612_2.png) [@tiwane](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/tiwane)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2026, 10:36pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/1 "2026-04-15T22:36:44Z")
Here are iNaturalist updates from March 2026! Sorry for the tardiness, I was on a desert trip in early April then got caught up in some other things. #### General updates - iNaturalist [introduced five new staff members](https://www.inaturalist.org/blog/126861-meet-the-newest-members-of-the-inaturalist-team)! - The iNat community [passed the 300m verifiable observations mark](https://www.inaturalist.org/blog/126478-inaturalist-at-300-million-observations)! - A new [Computer Vision model was released](https://www.inaturalist.org/blog/125913-updated-computer-vision-model-and-geomodel-with-over-1-500-new-taxa)! - Ran [Observation Accuracy Experiment v0.6](https://www.inaturalist.org/blog/124087-observation-accuracy-experiment-v0-6) - [Held a webinar](https://www.inaturalist.org/blog/126406) focused on general plant identification #### Product updates ##### Website - Various small bug fixes and improvements, like making sure focus goes to the text field when a curator hides content, or [filtering by state of matter life](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/no-longer-able-to-filter-for-state-of-matter-life-observations/75256) ##### iNaturalist (new app) Released version 1.0.18 (203). - Location picker circle [issue](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/observation-accuracy-ring-vary-between-platforms/65091) fixed - Reset password form no longer blocked by keyboard - When sharing photos from the Photos app to iNat, the app is opened directly - no confirmation screen - Fixed issue when going back after adding evidence to an observation - Continuing to investigate lag/slowness issues in the app. ##### Android No updates, but bug fixes are being worked on. Slow rollout of new version in Play Store currently ##### Seek Released version 2.17.9 (412) - Observations without a date or location can no longer be posted to iNat - Fixed Species Nearby taxon picker and the language picker ##### iNaturalist Classic - No updates For even more bug fixes and updates, check out [iNaturalist on github](https://github.com/inaturalist) and see [previous monthly updates](https://forum.inaturalist.org/tag/monthly-update). ##### iNat Blog - March 12: [Updated computer vision model and geomodel with over 1,500 new taxa](https://www.inaturalist.org/blog/125913-updated-computer-vision-model-and-geomodel-with-over-1-500-new-taxa) - March 19: [Identifying on iNaturalist: Getting Started with Plants](https://www.inaturalist.org/blog/126406-identifying-on-inaturalist-getting-started-with-plants) - March 20: [iNaturalist at 300 Million Observations](https://www.inaturalist.org/blog/126478-inaturalist-at-300-million-observations) - March 26: [Meet the newest members of the iNaturalist team](https://www.inaturalist.org/blog/126861-meet-the-newest-members-of-the-inaturalist-team) ---
**Author:** ![einsum](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/einsum/32/57161_2.png) [@einsum](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/einsum)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2026, 4:32am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/2 "2026-05-06T04:32:01Z")
> [@tiwane](#): > > - Observations without a date or location can no longer be posted to iNat is this seek feature going to be pushed to other platforms too like web and next apps? 🤔 it looks helpful check for entire platform. ---
**Author:** ![tiwane](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/tiwane/32/54612_2.png) [@tiwane](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/tiwane)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2026, 10:44pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/3 "2026-05-06T22:44:45Z")
Haven’t thought that far ahead yet. The main issue here was that Seek defaulted to a specific location and date if the observation didn’t have one or the other, and this was the cleanest way to prevent that from happening. I suspect we won’t totally block uploads for iNat in these cases. We already provide warnings in the web uploader if this info is missing, as well as in the new app: ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/uploads/inaturalist/original/3X/5/e/5eb06364fe1073ea965ccdbba6e4cc64cfafbcf4.png) ---
**Author:** ![davidp\_newton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ce7236/32.png) [@davidp\_newton](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/davidp_newton)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2026, 9:43pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/4 "2026-05-07T21:43:37Z")
It’s some good progress towards preventing junk uploads to the site. Another _very_ good step in that direction would be stopping the creation of observations without any media attached to them. There are huge numbers of “observations” which have neither photograph nor sound recording attached to them. At the very least the creation of them should be stopped if it hasn’t already been. If new creations have indeed already been stopped then going through and deleting all of the old junk “observations” of that type which exist would be a good idea too. They clog up the casual section of the site and may even reduce database performance since over all species there are likely hundreds of thousands of the things. ---
**Author:** ![cthawley](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/cthawley/32/1445_2.png) [@cthawley](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/cthawley)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2026, 11:49am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/5 "2026-05-08T11:49:32Z")
First off, there’s no need to use derogatory language, i.e., > [@davidp\_newton](#): > > junk uploads when referring to how other users engage with iNat. There are legitimate uses for media less observations. I have a few myself for cases where I have observed something, but haven’t gotten a photo. I want to remember the location and details, but don’t have evidence. This is no different than writing down field data in a notebook which is standard practice for researchers worldwide still (and was the predominant way of recording data until the widespread availability of digital cameras 20ish years ago). iNat staff have made clear that they approve of this type of use and have no intention of forbidding it. These observations are not in the ID queue by default, and are trivially easy to exclude from Explore/Identify/searches by selecting for observations that have specific media, so they aren’t an issue for the platform. ---
**Author:** ![anastasiiamerkulova](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/anastasiiamerkulova/32/68841_2.png) [@anastasiiamerkulova](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/anastasiiamerkulova)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2026, 12:49pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/6 "2026-05-08T12:49:44Z")
I’ve come across entire accounts with no photos at al just time and geotags. It’s clear people are using them as digital field diaries ---
**Author:** ![davidp\_newton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ce7236/32.png) [@davidp\_newton](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/davidp_newton)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2026, 3:11pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/7 "2026-05-08T15:11:17Z")
And here we go again. Language policing. > We expect you to submit information that you believe is an accurate assessment of the evidence provided … Now that continues on to refer specifically to deliberately false IDs and DQAs. However applying that phraseology only very slightly more widely and that was exactly what I was doing with what I said that you objected to. An “accurate assessment of the evidence provided”. No evidence is provided for the entries I referred to. They are mere unsupported assertion. So what am I supposed to call such unsupported assertions? They are not amenable to identification. They will never be amenable to identification. Even with unfortunately utterly blurry pictures or low quality sound recordings there is the possibility of attempting ID. It might be such a small possibility that functionally it does not actually exist in reality. Nevertheless it is theoretically there. With the unsupported assertions it is not even theoretically there. Do tell what adjective should then be used to describe such assertions on a platform such as iNaturalist? ---
**Author:** ![schoenitz](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/schoenitz/32/56_2.png) [@schoenitz](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/schoenitz)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2026, 3:24pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/8 "2026-05-08T15:24:36Z")
> [@davidp\_newton](#): > > So what am I supposed to call such unsupported assertions? Nothing. You’re not supposed to do anything with such observations. They’re not verifiable. They exist for the purposes of the observer. They’re of no concern to you. ---
**Author:** ![spiphany](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/spiphany/32/31332_2.png) [@spiphany](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/spiphany)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2026, 3:25pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/9 "2026-05-08T15:25:50Z")
> [@davidp\_newton](#): > > Do tell what adjective should then be used to describe such assertions Media-less observations. ---
**Author:** ![upupa-epops](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/upupa-epops/32/1972_2.png) [@upupa-epops](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/upupa-epops)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2026, 8:48pm UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/10 "2026-05-08T20:48:41Z")
The average eBird observation involves the same level of evidence and they are sent to GBIF in that state. eBird does require comments for unusual submissions and those are vetted by experienced reviewers, but technically anyone on iNat can add correction IDs or clarification requests to media-less obs as well. ---
**Author:** ![einsum](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/forum.inaturalist.org/einsum/32/57161_2.png) [@einsum](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/einsum)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2026, 4:05am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/11 "2026-05-10T04:05:21Z")
> [@davidp\_newton](#): > > They clog up the casual section of the site and may even reduce database performance since over all species there are likely hundreds of thousands of the things. just an headsup, if you use proper URL filter, such query is already efficient in finding things ones care of and so what matters atleast to me is realtime performance in those cases with filter like &photos=true or &sounds=true. Any perceived clog/reduce-db-performance is almost nil in such desired filter; even if there are hundreds of thousands of such things on entire site one proper “specific search” URL query will rarely effect db query performance for that user interactions. if you meant they clog the storage (mute as they are medialess in first place so 100-1000x low storage) and there is background processing to organise these by site, it comes with any data storage mechanisms, "suppose I only care of xyz datapoint, so everything else that inat serves on site _by default_ via its API full fields results beyond my usecase looks performance reduction to me 🙃 ", so just as there is need for other data fields for others, there can just as be need for these medialess observations for lots of others usecases. and as others said of ebird and pre-inat, even if modern science is reliant on explicit evidence by media, go back to 300 year old literature, and all I see mostly are three line sentences for n.sp. descriptions and pray that there are no later lookalikes and hope someone offered differential diagnosis atleast for that future similar species 😂 yes those descriptions can be revalidated today from taxonomists and new evidence but the point remains they were anchored as medialess text too in first place or as a note in new survey checklists akin to medialess observation at location and date. ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/uploads/inaturalist/original/2X/7/7831452cf7f0d653ff1ffd34176334b7ef1b6a17.png) [@system](https://forum.inaturalist.org/u/system)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2026, 4:06am UTC](https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/inaturalist-updates-for-march-2026/77845/12 "2026-07-09T04:06:05Z")
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