Platform(s): website for sure, I’m not sure how the mobile app works… Description of need: Currently, new users sometimes use the CV before adding the location. This leads to a whole lot of misidentifications. For example an Indian Cormorant in Mumbai was identified as “Neotropical Cormorant” by t…

I’ve approved this request for discussion, though I think it unlikely to be implemented. See related declined feature request here about changing order so users would see location entry at top line on uploading: https://forum.inaturalist.org/t/switch-upload-order-from-species-date-place-to-place-d…

[image] Switch upload order from species/date/place to place/date/species Tangent. Is it possible to find how many obs have 1, or 2, or 3 disagreeing IDs? That more than two thirds rule racks up fast. 1 wrong needs 3 to convince - makes sense. 2 wrong need 5 - why not stay with 3 (especially …

Thank you for raising this request. It is an easy way to improve identification quality.

This is why the CV distinguishes between visually similar and expected nearby. Sometimes it is helpful to see suggestions that are not from your location, particularly in underrepresented regions.

[image] GeolTel: The order of fields on the Upload web page should be swapped, maybe. Have Location above Species name. See my first comment on this thread (second post). Since this request has been declined, let’s focus discussion here on the OP’s request.

In theory I would agree with your request. In fact, the CV suggests things from different continents for me all the time, so I don’t see the point. Maybe some day.

I don’t think location necessarily needs to be required for CV to work, though I don’t really see any reason why it shouldn’t be as all iNat observations should have a location. That is the most logical/useful solution. If that can’t be implemented, I do agree that a prompt when trying to add an ID…

Would this cause the CV to not work if location couldn’t be loaded? In bad service Inat tends to slow down and only gives CV without location knowledge(even though I know the correct ID without the AI). The AI for me is a shortcut, so I don’t really like this idea.

It might cause adding wrong locations. Maybe it s a better idea not to suggest ID’s below the genus level.

[image] optilete: Maybe it s a better idea not to suggest ID’s below the genus level. That wouldn’t help in the situation described in the OP. The Indian Cormorant is in Genus Phalacrocorax, whereas the Neotropical Cormorant is in Genus Nannopterum.

While uploading new observations, CV shouldn't work if location is not provided.

Feature Requests

spiphany September 9, 2025, 5:57am 20

I don’t understand. Observations are already automatically casual if they are uploaded without a location.

Topic		Replies	Views
Switch upload order from species/date/place to place/date/species Feature Requests declined	54	1512	March 18, 2023
The role of CV in the new mobile app General mobile-app	93	2562	April 25, 2025
Better use of location in Computer Vision suggestions Feature Requests	53	8597	April 13, 2021
Computer Vision and Text Entry when adding IDs General	32	384	December 30, 2025
CV suggestions are bizarre, not "visually similar" at all Bug Reports	65	2157	February 2, 2023

While uploading new observations, CV shouldn't work if location is not provided.

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