Merlin Bird ID Status

can not install a bird pack

Merlin has stopped saving my recordings

Malaysia and SE Asia packs installed, recording but nothing identified at all .Reinstalled still no

no identification

App Filter won’t switch from “All installed birds” to “Likely birds.” It just cycles.

I’ve enjoyed using Merlin for years and suddenly it stopped finding matches, descriptions, sound or photos. Could I have a setting wrong?

Just not recognising birds now. Do not know what is wrong and very slow. Put a picture of sanderling on a good clear picture but saying it is a gannet or a curlew. Used to be good but no idea what is going on now.

Submissions are failing : it says it's Internet issues but my internet is all fine. Rebooting did not work.

No display of species in “Explore”. iPhone 15 pro.

Today a problem occurred that has occurred in the past, but not to such a degree as today. After I had used the "Sound ID" feature a few times, the app froze. The green circular "hourglass" would swirl around and around for five, ten, fifteen minutes. I tried the following ways to get that to stop: closing the app, tapping on other features of the app (such as "Explore" and "Settings"); waiting. The only thing that worked was restarting the phone, which is an Android phone. After each restart, the app would give me one and only one chance to ID a bird vocalization; then, once I pressed the red "stop recording" button, the app would freeze again.

The app IDs the birds and seems to record them BUT I am unable to retrieve the recorded ones.

Recording 15 minutes this morning, saw all the birds identified, went to save recording, received the following error: "There was an error loading the recording." Lost a new lifer. Extremely bummed.

I inadvertently recorded 1 hour of birds in a single recording. As I was deleting several old recordings to free up space on my Android phone, I cannot delete this very long recording using the methods suggested. Can you help? Thank you.

I acquired a new Samsung phone and Verizon transferred my old LG phone's apps. However, the 635 sound recordings which did transfer to the new phone no longer appear in Merlin. It appears that the android app data file linking the recordings did not transfer to the new phone. How can I restore to the previous state where the bird ids are associated with the recordings?

When selecting my recordings, there is a green bar that comes up at the top with an X that deselects recordings. If I select that it deselects the recordings. It won't allow me to delete the recordings. This is not the way it worked before. Is there some setting that changed?

Merlin is no longer playing the bird songs when I want to hear a certain bird's song. What do I do? Iphone 10 is my device.

Since purchasing a iPhone 15 my Merlin app doesn’t show the bird id photos. Please advise- thanks

Doesn’t play records

it keeps telling me my password is incorrect even though i'm using the password i saved to my password manager last time i used the app. i tried to reset my password and the email isn't coming through.

The app recorded my birds but now it will not let me in to see my bird list. It keeps going round and round but will not open. Android pixel 7.

Reporting lots of birds names but no pictures added all of Mexico origin I live in the Uk and it will not open up

It is stuck on updating bird list. Tried uninstalling but it is still stuck

Hi - I get a black bar saying uploading species list but nothing happens! Tried on iphone and ipad with same result. Tried deleting app and reinstalling and same result.

I get a message that my five-day grace period is over, and I have to go to email to confirm. I have asked that the message to confirm be re-sent several times, and I get no message that allows me to confirm my email address: janemullerpeterson@redacted.

I suddenly can't save to my life list. When I hit save, it says "submission failed." And why do I all of a sudden HAVE to fill in "yard" or "tree" or whatever? I don't like having to do that. Getting ready to go with another bird app.

Made recording, but left it running for about 2.5 hours by mistake. Trying to delete file but it won't load so I can dump it. Suggestions?

I've been trying for DAYS to install the bird pack for southern Bolivia (on e of the smalller ones for S america!) and it keeps saying downloading. My user data is 2.11 GB. I don't need the data i've collected when ID'ing birds... so is that an OK thing to delete? clear? Or is User Data the Bird Packs? The cache is only 170 MB, smaller than any of the bird packs I have installed (Chile, Argentina and Antarctica only). Maybe that's what I can clear out? HELP! Please.

My app is not able to record. When I look for the app in the list of apps that have requested access to the iPhone mic, it is not listed.

I am unable to add to my life list through e-bird, and I always get a message that there was an error loading my life list when I click on it from the Merlin app. I can see a list of birds as long as my screen, but I cannot scroll down.

I love the bird sound id!!! I used to call the birds to me after ID...awesome! Now, when I send out the song from my phone, I can hardly hear it, much less the bird in the tree. My phone volume is up, I hear my alarm???? What am I doing poorly??

New phone. Installed app. It's hearing birds but will not list what's being heard.

I’m one of many people who keep getting the ‘five day grace periode is over’ but are not receiving an email. Why isn’t this issue fixed yet?

Any idea why my recordings are disappearing from my iPhone 14? I had 24, including Indigo Bunting, Scarlet Tanager, and Yellow-Bellied Sapsuckers, but they are not there anymore! I am absolutely certain I did not manually delete them - is there a limit?

Used Merlin Bird ID for a few days - very impressed. But then I was told to confirm my email to continue which I did several times but I have since received no email from 'confirm@redacted'. I have sent a request to 'confirm@redacted' only to receive a message that my request was 'undeliverable'. This is a real shame - as a said above, I was very impressed with this App.

I am unable to install any Bird Pack on my new iPhone 14. I have tried a number of times including deleting and reinstalling the app. Interestingly, the Bird Pack installed almost immediately on my iPad. What’s the problem? Thanks. Prudence

After I added upgrade of North American birds, Merlin app won’t make matches—example: I clicked date, allowed location, size between sparrow and robin, color black and white, at feeder and it said no matches!!

I video record a bird singing using my camera, then convert the MP4 file to just an MP3 sound file, and then try to open it with Merlin ID Sound, and it always says 'there was an error opening the file', Can MP3s recorded with other tools be read by Merlin ID, and if so, how can I do that? Thanks much. Merlin ID Sound works fine when recording directly from my ipad.

The Merlin bird id’s explore birds isn’t working properly. If I click family on explore birds and push enter the screen shows nothing. I hope this gets fixed soon because it is a great way to know what birds are in my area.

Sound ID won’t download after I downloaded the app in my iPhone with IOS 13. The photo ID did download though.

Merlin calls out 3 time as many species on my iPhone XR as it does on my wife's iPhone 8. Is this differences in the microphones? We have checked all the settings and cleaned the microphone apertures.

App not displaying bird id when recording on a Samsung A3 2016

Failure to record. I’ve twice run for forty minutes or so, and when I stop recording the stop button becomes an everlasting progress indicator, responding only to shutdown, with loss of the recording.

Hi. Im getting a message saying my 5 day grace period is over and need to confirm my email but the email you send me to do so doesnt arrive in my inbox or junk even when i request to resend email.

I'm also having the problem of just getting the "Your 5 day grace period is over" message and to confirm my email to continue. It says that it sent an email to my address, but it never comes and it's not in spam. Can't get past this screen to actually use the app.

I can't retrieve any recordings longer than about 25 minutes. It just hangs and I have to quit. Please can you help!

never loaded correctly - received 'five day grace period' error message, then will not resend email.

My Merlin App keeps freezing. I get a circle on the screen that never seems to finish.

I recorded sounds today and can not retrieve all of them...

My Merlin bird app (Android) always says "no match found". It says listening for birds. Then it says bird heard or something like that. Then when I stop recording it says "no match found". Samsung Galaxy A03S I have re-downloaded (May 17 Google Play Store) the Midwest package, stopped the app, uninstalled and reinstalled the app. It's like there is a disconnect between the recording and the ID. Thanks, Out of ideas

Everytime I try to save a bird to my life list I get the Error "Submission failed. Please check your internet connection" but it happens no matter where I am, at home, at my mother in-law's, or at work.

Many times when I am using the sound id, the app freezes and stops working. Other times it works fine.

Since the last update sound ID freezes and I am unable to get out of it for a while and then finally I can clear it out.

5 day error message and never get email to verify. Reload app and same thing happens over and over.

I can no longer save birds to my life list. I get an error regarding not being connected to the internet, which is definitely not the case. It also gives me an error that my life list cannot be retrieved

I have loaded Merlin on 2 different samsung phones A20S and A54. When I record a bird call I can see that the app is recording and can play back the bird but the app always says Merlin couldn't identify (It is a moderately loud northern cardinal) I couldn't do other common birds either. It says (The bird you are hearing might not be in our database) I have the North America profile loaded and the rest of merlin seems ok as far as I know. I also responded to the email after loading the app. Microphone and location are on in settings though it couldn't ID where I am but the app doesn't indicate that is "A Must Have". I have a solid wifi connection. So for this to happen on 2 phones, What's Up ????

Only get need active internet connection message when trying to log. Mpalmer user name

have enjoyed a trial of this application and would like to continue using it. However, I find myself in a loop and unable to access the app. It asks me to verify my email address. When I do that it tells me I should receive an email from you, but it does not arrive. It is not in my spam file either. Can you help me with this? Thank you, Mary Ann Hogan

Had to reinstall Merlin to get it to work again to recognize bird sounds. Also turned on location. It now records the bird sounds, which are quite loud, but the wav recording volume is extremely low. Even when I turn my speakers to their highest setting I can barely hear the birds.

When I either upload or take a photo, on the second screen only the topmost left corner of the picture appears, drastically zoomed in. I've done nothing to crop it. So the app has "sees" only a tiny fraction of the photo (a corner) and can't identify any birds. Why does it do this? it didn't do this before.

When playing back my recording, the active birds used to be highlighted, so you could tel which one was currently singing. Now there is no more highlighting. I tried restarting the phone, no joy

I have a sound recording of 33 birds for one hour and 53 minutes. It uploaded to the save section. However, it will not load that recording to show the different birds it just goes back to the home screen of Merlin.

When I first downloaded the Merlin app the bird pictures were in color. They are now black & white. What can I do to correct this issue? Just love the app by the way. Thanks so much

For the past couple of weeks, recordings will disappear within a day of taking them.

I recorded an unusual bird on Dec 31 2022. I went back to listen to it and it was gone. This is possibly a rare bird and I would like to be able to retrieve the call. Any suggestions? Thank you! Linda

I have a new iPhone and the sounds I recorded and saved do not show up on my new iPhone. Also, sounds recorded and saved on my iPad did not and do not show up on iPhone before switch to new iPhone. How can I sync the iPad and iPhone sounds saved?

The app isn't picking up any bird sounds anymore. It shows the graph going, but doesn't seem to pick up the birds that are out there, that I hear. Not as sensitive as it was in summer.

I got a new phone and my Merlin app no longer has the colored birds when they pop up.

I got a new phone and my Merlin app no longer has the colored birds when they pop up.

Recently the Merlin drains the battery in an instant when I get to the last step to identify a bird in the "ID a Bird" feature. I confirmed this last time before opening Merlin I had 77% power. When I was scrolling through the possible birds to identify the screen went blank and I couldn't restart the phone. When I got home and plugged it in it had zero power. It is possible there is a correlation with the PocketCast app. I believe (not really certain) that each time it has happened it was while I was listening to a podcast and then I opened Merlin to identify a bird. It definitely happens at that last step of Bird ID though. I have Android 9 on a Samsung Galaxy S9+ Paul

The app drains the battery even when not in use (only is an issue when the app has been used recently) Is there a setting to avoid this?

I cannot add a bird to my saved list…i identify the bird, the location and date are in and recognized. EWhen I press the next button the option to save the identified bird is not given….

Sound id is stopped working on my phone. I have galaxy s10 with android 12. The sound Id worked fine but suddenly it stopped working. Now when I try to use it, no sound is recording any more. Seems like the app is not connected to the internal microphone any more. Other apps that use the microphone is working well.

I received “five day grace period over… check email to confirm. No email has come in and not in spam either.

When I turn on Merlin and push voice, it does not work.

The birds' photos are not showing in the app. Thanks.

After free trial the page keeps reverting to original page I’m unable to sign up

The Merlin Bird ID app keeps crashing and locking up my iPhone (I have an iPhone 10). Usually, I can just kill the app then restart my phone and it works again. Two days ago, I tried the same method to fix it, but I was unable to power my phone back on after I had powered it down. When I would try to power up my phone, I would see the Apple logo briefly and then it would disappear and the screen went black. I was able to power up the phone after plugging in the charging cord. Today, I followed the instructions to delete the app and then reinstall it from the App Store. And I downloaded and installed 2 bird packs (Midwest and all US/Canada). It seems to be working now but I am afraid to use it because it may lock up my phone again and I may not be able to power up my phone afterwards. I like the app when it works, especially the Sound ID. But I really do not like how it locks up my phone sometimes when I try to use the Sound ID feature. Is there anything I or you can do to correct this problem, besides what I have already done?

I had merlin installed on my phone with a short list of sound id'd birds and the West coast and Rockyt Mountain packets installed. The installation disappeared. I did a search on the phone and I see that the birds I had on my list appear to be on the drive but they are not showing up after I reinstalled the program. I am new to the program so I do not have an extensive list of recordings but I would still like to see them on the app.

Hi there, I am a frequent user of the different features of Merlin apps, especially sound id. Yet, since a few weeks, I do not have any curve of frequency appearing on the screen while recording and no bird identification being made. Autorisation for microphone and camera are approved for the app. I tried to reinstall the app which is on the latest version without any success. If you have any idea how to solve this problem it would be great. Cheers, Etienne

Merlin is stuck on “Explore bird” . Cannot cancel or go back to other ways to if birds.

Am not receiving emails to confirm my email address

Microphone not recording in sound ID on galaxy s20. Appropriate permissions have been granted and mic works on other apps. Worked great on my old galaxy s7

Longer recordings will not load for playback.

I received a message to confirm my email after the 5 day grace period expired but the email never arrived. I’ve submitted numerous requests and checked the spam folder as instructed. I have not received the email and cannot access the app.

My merlin app drains the battery excessively even when I'm not using it

I tried to load the Likely Birds list on my older iPad. It just keeps churning and I can’t force a quit except by closing the app. Is uninstall my best option?- screen is unresponsive

App is frozen

It keeps telling me it’s sending me an email because my 5 day period is up, but I am not getting any emails.

I have the app, but I got a message from them that said my 5 day trial was up, and they needed to confirm my email. I pressed the confirm email button, but it wouldn't do anything. There was also a place on the message to resend, and that didn't do anything either.

I downloaded the app and it worked for a week. Then I got a message I needed to check my email to continue. I have never received an email, and I no longer have a working app. I have an iphone. What to do?

Will not send me a confirmation email

The app isn't recording sound at all unfortunately. Samsung galaxy s20 plus I have provided permission where I can think of but nothing :-(

I can’t confirm my email after the 5-day grace period. I don’t get the email message to confirm from Merlin. I’ve checked my spam filters and created a contact for cornellbirds@redacted. Please help. I don’t want to lose the birds I identified during the grace period.

I also have a OnePlus 7T phone and have the message location not found. This started happening after the Android 11 upgrade. If I uninstall and reinstall Merlin, it will work once, but then it's completely unusable. I really like Marlin! Please fix this!

The screen displays a swirling "daisy" in a black square. I can's shut down the program and it's unresponsive to an attempt to open links in the upper left . Thanks for your help! --Dana

Sound ID not working on iPhone

The email never came

accidently recorded 50 minutes. used up all my data plan. question is where this recording went since it does not show under "my sound recordings" (I didn't wait for it all to be saved with the red circle indicator)

"There was an error importing the file." What encoder options does Sound ID recognize?

Hello Sorry to say getting no response from you. Sound ID not working on Samsung S10+ Otherwise amazing wanted to donate but really wanted the sound ID Dave

It keeps freezing up, only way to access anything is from the first dropdown page then that freezes. Was going to delete and reinstall but don't want to be charged again?

Song ID isn't working with Android phone. Very, very few ID's in spite of loud bird calls. Works fine on my wife's apple phone.

app will not register or record any sound on samsung s21 android 12.

I have had this app for one week and I did confirm my email but now the message I’m getting is “You must confirm your email…” “Email sent…” I never received an email to confirm again and now the app will not open. I am still registered with the Cornell Lab.

Merlin has caused messenger to lose sound, so I can't have group chats.

The app was working for awhile but now it won’t open and says to check spam folder but nothing’s there.

New install Bird pack will not download, stuck at 0% iPhone X My wife has iPhone 8, works fine

Won’t open sends email verification pop up BUT email never comes I like this app when it works

I don’t receive the email to confirm after five day grace period. Have tried multiple times with three different emails, have checked spam folder. Please help!!

I don’t receive the email to confirm after five day grace period. Have tried multiple times with two different emails, have checked spam folder. Solution?

Love this app when it works. But…..it always asks to confirm email which I cannot find in my mail. I ask it to send again and still nothing. I even removed the app and reinstalled but the exact same issue. I would love to continue using this app but I will permanently delete if this can’t be fixed. Help!

Works perfectly on my iPad. But on my Samsung S10 Android phone the sonagram stops working after the first session and then only works again after I have rebooted the phone. I have turned off Google assistant and all other access to the microphone. Love everything else about this app. Will I get a response to cure this problem?

Turn off the google assistant under google assistant settings and the merlin app should work again

Turning off Google Assistant fixed Merlin for me on my Moto G Power

I upgraded to a Moto Power G and the Merlin App no longer identifies bird calls. The old Moto G6 worked fine.

I recently upgraded to a moto g power (2021) and Merlin no longer recognizes any birds. I am not sure what to do. I enjoyed using this app on my previous phone, moto g6.

For the past month people with Android 11 I've noticed that the sound ID is no longer working on Merlin. It seems that the new Google Assistant microphone is interfering with picking up the microphone and recording with certain apps. All you need to do is go to Google Assistant settings and turn off the Google Assistant while using the Merlin app and it should work again.

Message when trying to record: unable to record. Make sure Merlin has microphone access in settings. I have an iOS phone, when I go to microphone in settings there Merlin is not listed and I don’t know how to add it. The only thing I see is a button App Clips which is checked. I never had an issue before in making a sound recording on Merlin.

Merlin won't pick up high frequency bird sounds

As “my 5 day grace period is over”, Merlin says it sent me an email to confirm, but no email. Tried numerous times.

I am not receiving the email to confirm because the grace period is up

For several weeks I have not been able to import sound recording files stored on iCloud to “My Sound Recordings” - this is a new problem. I get this message - “There was an error importing the file.” Before I was able record bird song on Apple’s Voice Record app, save the .wav files to iCloud, and then import to Merlin Sound ID. This was a great way to recheck ID in addition to using BirdNET. The Voice Record app makes much better recordings than Merlin which has no way to control the recording and produces low volume recordings - barely audible most of the time after uploading to my eBird lists.

Was working. Now get message the app could not find location. Location setting is set to allow when app is open. Using Samsung Galaxy 9 phone.

Merlin was working fine until the past two weeks, we get a fuzzy background in the sonagram and the app is hearing birds but unable to to ID them, even when there is no background noise, the songarm shows it. Have cleaned microphone but hasn't fixed anything.

Camera screen is black when I want to take a picture of a bird and I am not able to do so,

5 day grace period over. Please confirm email. I confirmed the first day and have tried again but I’ve yet to receive an email.

I too have a OnePlus 7T phone. Just like John Bowman posted above, I get the message "Merlin couldn't determine your location".

The first time I used sound i.d. on Merlin on my Android phone it worked great and heard lots of birds. The second time and ever since it can't seem to hear any birds even if they are close and pretty loud. The se is true for my spouse except I don't think his ever worked. Thanks. This is very frustrating!

App hangs. Only solution seems to be to delete it and reinstall

Merlin freezes when I try to see certain lists of recordings. It seems this happens when the recordings are long- like 18 minutes. I have tried deleting the old files, but when I go to view a long file, this happens. Only once have I received a message that the app is not responding and do I want to close it. Usually I have to shut down the phone. But since I decided to delete old recordings, I keep running into this problem as I try to look at the file to delete it. I only started using this within a week after installing it. This did not start happening until a few days ago. Merlin has detected about 80 birds singing in my yard in a week. I love it!

iphone: bird pack will not install, stalls at 2-3% -- over and over. have rebooted phone, turned wifi and data on and off, pausing both in "off" for at least 30 seconds, etc.

Overall, Merlin is working great. But a few times when it tried to save a recording, something got screwed up in the app and it failed to save properly. (OK, things like that happen.) I tried then to delete these failed recordings, but if I try to open them to "delete", I get an error message saying "There was an error loading the recording". (I knew that, which is why I just wanted to delete it.) The only thing Merline will let me do at that point is say "OK" and leave the faulty recoding in place. Thus, now, I can't delete the faulty recordings. It isn't a big deal -- I just ignore them -- but I don't want to be occasionally accumulating faulty recordings in "My Sound Recordings". Is there any way to delete them?

Same as many others here... recently the Sound ID stopped identifying any birds. Uninstalled, restarted phone, and re-installed app, no change. It happened about the same time (mid-May) as others have noted here. Guessing a bug in an update?

Can’t seem to sync Merlin app with microphone in Settings. Merlin doesn’t show up on App Clips seeking access to the microphone. iOS 15.5, 5/30/22

Earlier the sund ID worked perfectly. Now I keep getting the message that there are no matches and that Merlin could not determine location or download birds for my area. I have data set for entire US!

Every time I try to save a bird, I get tue message "submission failed. Check internet connection. My internet is fine. Only Merlin is failing

5 day trial over and will not send me the confirmation email needed to continue using the app

Sound ID used to work perfectly... stopped working recently. Looks like mic level is too low and not picking up much unless it is very close to the mic. Even then it does not identify a single bird.

With the Sound ID: It is "listening for birds," and it is "hearing a bird," but no matches appear on the screen. My sound recordings worked great in the past. The last time the app worked properly was May 12.

My Merlin bird app stopped working last week. I tried uninstalling it several times and reinstalling, but to no avail. The app won't record any sounds and sometimes gives me an error that there is a bug in the app.

I just installed Merlin on my Android phone. It starts ok and then simply stops, ie, the sonagram stops moving. The stop button has no effect at that point. If I try 'clear all' I get a 'Merlin isn't responding' box request, but even then, it doesn't close. I usually need to reboot my phone to close Merlin and get it going again--with the same problem recurring . When it worked, it confused a Bobwhite with a Robin and then with a Red-bellied Woodpecker.

On the Merlin App, the Sound ID portion on my Android Phone appears to work but doesn’t identify any of the bird species around me by sound. It picks up talking according to the graph but barely any birds, In the past it would pick up birds I couldn't hear, but could then find. It’s always worked great until a week ago. Re-downloaded 2 times and still barely works. It I.D. one bird around me a Great Crested Fly Catcher, I can I.D. 5 more species around me. The BirdNET sound I.D. App still works though. Two other birders we see often also have the same problem.

Same as others are have said, sound ID never identifies any birds, even when they're loud and nearby. The sonogram never gets above the background noise in the bottom 20% of the display.

Keeps identifying tufted titmouse as an eastern towhee, and sometimes as a crow!!!

After the initial 5 days it says your 5 day period is us please confirm your email I’ve tries and tries but receive no message in my inbox or junk mail to confirm it. Tried deleting app and reinstalling but it’s saying the same. Very frustrated as it’s a brilliant app to help me.

Sound ID not working. Will record my voice (barely), but no birds id'd in last week or so. Tried it with All about birds recordings and could id the Canada Goose (wow), nothing else. Have really enjoyed this app when it works. Was suspecting my old Moto e, but from other comments everyone is having this problem. My grown kids are using this too so will ask them if it works with their better phones. Haven't tried an external mike (will one work with the Moto e?) Any fixes in the works??? Thanks

Hi, when i use the sound part of the app it locks up. There are no clear directions anywhere about how to use the red button , the x, or any other basics. I am on a trail and suddenly i find that after the apps been on for ie 45 secs it has stopped. Or, more than 2 min has gone by, and i try to exit anf start the id over, pressing the red buutton, it locks up. Or it, after pushing a variety of options or just one, a circle starts spinning in the center of the screen, and may continue for minutes or never stop. So i try tapping a general phone icon to switch apps, but everything is locked. Samsung phone 3 yrs old. Functions beautifully in all other situations. Can you help. We love ebird and cornell. We will stay with you even if we cant use sound app.

The audio stopped working recently and I have tried deleting the app twice and reinstalling it, I have tried working with a different email address and installing the current Upgrade on my iPhone. Nothing seems to work and it’s clear from the discussion groups that this app is developing a common flaw. Can you fix it?

Merlin won't download

The first week Merlin sound ID worked great. I walked out my door and it identified 10 birds in a couple of minutes. Then it stopped hearing birds well enough to identify them. I was very close to a very loud singing bird and it did not detect it.