Mobile App Review - Singapore Bird Guide

I am reviewing the Nature Society (Singapore)’s Singapore Bird Guide App. The first thing I’ll mention about this app and it’s sister app, the Singapore Butterfly Guide, is that they are only available on Apple products, there is not an equivalent for the Android OS. That said, when you open the Singapore Bird Guide, it opens to the ‘BROWSE’ page, where you can click from a pull down how you want to view the birds, as well as what birds you want to see based on residency or visitors and those in between. These are both nice features depending on how you visually would like to view the birds as well as if you know the potential birds migration patterns. 

If you click on the ‘SEARCH’ option, you can type a bird into the search bar but you can also click on its rarity or habitat, if you know those. If you then click on the bird you search, the result page is very user friendly. This page will provide the common name, scientific name, a picture (identified as either male or female), its rarity and habitat as well as a brief description of the bird. Some birds even have a sound icon and it will pronounce the common and scientific name as well as a sound bite of the bird, very cool! Under this information, you have the option to add it to a list, look at similar birds, compare with other birds (I’ll explain this more later), as well as sharing this bird with others through Facebook or email. 

On the ‘COMPARE’ page, you can click up to five birds by browsing through the birds. When you switch over to the comparisons, it is essentially a larger picture of the birds closer together to hopefully find some distinctions between your options. 

The ‘LIST’ option is where you can add a sighting list for a particular event or outing. You can add details such as title, descriptions, date, time, GPS, participants, and notes.  When a list is highlighted yellow, you can add birds to that list (as mentioned above in the search result page). The app created a *Life list that compiles all of your lists together to show you all of the birds you’ve seen. Additionally, you can provide details of your sighting including how many individuals you saw and provides you with an overall count of # birds, # species at the top of your sightings. 

In the ‘MORE’ section, it provides you with some details of the app but also gives you the options of exporting your sighting list through email or to Excel, a very neat feature. Overall, I was very impressed with this app for birds in Singapore. Most of the pictures are very clear and I really appreciate having the ability to make lists when out in the field. My only recommendation would be for more sound options, or breaking up the sounds into different calls. Additionally, it would be nice to see a map with any potential movement or where to see the resident species of birds.