eBird User Reviews

Customer Experience

Positive experience36.5% of reviews
Neutral18.4% of reviews
Negative experience45.1% of reviews

~ Based on 348 written reviews from the US App Store.

What users say

Is eBird Safe?

eBird appears mostly safe based on user ratings. AppsHunter Safety Score for eBird is 76/100.

This assessment is based on 796 user ratings, with an App Store average of 3.8/5.

Safety Analysis

67.6% of ratings point to a safe experience
9.8% of ratings suggest some concerns
22.6% of ratings point to a risky experience

~ Based on 796 App Store ratings for eBird.

Is eBird Legit?

eBird appears to be a legitimate app. AppsHunter Legitimacy Score for eBird is 85/100.

Based on 85 of 100 points across 7 verification signals from App Store and developer data.

Top reviews

Interesting app

Separate app from Merlin which I have been using for years. Will see how this plays. Always interested in being a citizen scientist observer of nature!

Omg what did you do?

Latest “greatest” version wiped out my recordings from years and more. Forced to create a username and login, I had to begin downloading packs again. Downloading is slow.

What happened to what packages I had that existed before? I had some for other regions in the world. Recordings of those birds lost. Unbelievably sad.

I have zero of my history. Nada.

I am hugely disappointed in this. It was one of my favorite apps. Definitely a bad decision on Cornell’s part to leave users behind.
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Was great, but now stopped working

It was good until it stopped. I can’t submit my checklist. Can’t get support. Looks like we’re finished with this app.

Incredible app! Please add a widget feature

I’d love to see a widget for easy accessibility

Needs Work.

App is very clunky and difficult to navigate. Need the ability to log a checklist from anywhere in the country instead of only in my close radius. Birds should be sorted by location by showing the most recent birds up top. So much scrolling to find the birds that are actually at the location. Would love the ability to see a profile or photo of the birds by clicking the species in the checklist options.
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Freezes on ‘Install a pack’ screen

Mac desktop app doesn’t work

I love ebird

I love ebird

THE essential birding app for pros and newbies

While EBird’s cousin Merlin is mostly for beginners, (although it is still amazing), it is mostly for newer birders learning still. EBird is the best place for everybody of all skill levels to find birds, report birds, and keep track of the ones you’ve seen

Not compatible with ipad

I often go birding with my ipad because i have a keyboard attached. I like the larger screen. This is not compatible with an iPad, and I didn’t see a description that explicitly said that. Too bad, thus the 3 star rating.

My Favourite App

I LOVE this app, plain and simple. The ability to log your sightings while contributing to citizen science is such a powerful tool for conservation! Being able to see recent sightings of each bird in your region can help inform birding outings greatly!

No good

Deleting this app. Can’t get past purchase packs screen. Disappointing.

Gatekeeping at its worst

I have been birding for over 20 years and I started using this app for a local bird count. You will get an email if you see an uncommon or rare bird man-splaining to you that I IDed it wrong despite my report notes. This app also marks reports that are valid with explanations for the identification provided as “incomplete.” Not everyone is an amateur, so don’t assume we are ignorant, and if you want to expand bird science as you claim, especially in the transition areas where I live and regularly see some rare birds, stop the rude emails and the unnecessary gatekeeping. One wonders how this man who has no EB affiliation with his email address got my email address in the first place so there’s some privacy questions about your data management that you also may want to address.
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Last Update Broke the App

Latest update caused a lot of issues, I frequently get logged out and have to log back in and the explore tab takes forever to load or doesn’t work at all most days

Always an issue

Now it won’t even let me select the location so I can no longer submit lists.

This app sucks

It said I had 23 species but it went down to 19 this app sucks I don’t recommend

Glitchy but what else is there?

I always have problems with locations and the app crashing. Or it is just plain slow. Especially after a day of birding. Looking for something else to manage my bird lists.

Best way to log, Worst interface

I love eBird unequivocally and I use it each and every day for logging birds I see. For that purpose, it’s the best tool you can use.

That being said, the look of the app is terrible, as well as many features “timing out” or just taking forever to load regardless of connection. 50% of the time I open the app and enter the explore page, it times out and I have to re enter my location and wait another 15 seconds for it to pull it up.

So many people use eBird to give Cornell free data! Millions of data points every year. Conservation efforts have been largely waged on eBird data, so why aren’t the users compensated with an app they’ll actually enjoy to use? It functions as 2010 technology with proportional load times.

eBird, I love you, but please improve the app.
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Can use without extra downloads

I wish I could opt out of installing packs to use this. I can’t get past the pack installing screen because it keeps getting stuck. Should be an option to just use the online features without installing anything for offline.

Buggy

I use to love this app but now I can’t use it. It will not track or load a bird pack at all. I’ve done everything I know to do. When it did work it crashed and froze often. Hopefully someone will sort it out.

Harder now to add photos

I used to be able to add photos to my list from my iPhone. Now I have to take a photo and download it to a computer. There is a media button then to add photo. It more complicated than I’m willing to do.