Features & guides

Sign up and sign in with email, Sign in with Apple (iOS), or Google. Email accounts confirm via a link sent to your inbox. Passwords require uppercase, lowercase, a number, and a symbol — and are checked against the HaveIBeenPwned breach database so weak / known-compromised passwords are rejected.

Your name stays yours. Signup asks for your first and last name, and they are never shown publicly — your username is your public identity everywhere on LootScout, and you can set an optional display name on top of it. Other collectors, shop pages, and search results only ever see the username.

Forgot your password? Tap Forgot password? on the login screen. We’ll email a recovery link that opens straight into the app via Universal Links / App Links.

Tabs: Home, Collection, Profile, with Scanner, Shop dashboard, and Pickup routes available based on your tier and account type. Pull to refresh on supported screens reloads server-backed data.

Portfolio shows collection value and gain/loss (scope may follow folder filters). Pull to refresh updates figures. A value-over-time chart tracks your collection’s total worth day by day, so you can watch your portfolio grow over weeks and months instead of seeing only today’s number.

Product search: While typing, search is database / catalog only — fast, without live TCG API on every keystroke. When you submit (Search / Enter), the app runs a hybrid search path that may call external APIs when appropriate, then merges and caches results.

Listings search: Switch to listings mode when available; use filters (price, condition, distance, etc.). Distance may require location permission.

Map: Browse nearby listings on an interactive map to see what’s for sale around you, then meet up in person.

Wishlist & price alerts: Add cards to your wishlist and get notified when a match is listed near you. Set price alerts (Plus and up) to watch the market and hear about moves on items you care about.

See also: FAQ — external APIs while typing.

Open from search or scanner match. Choose RAW vs GRADED (trading cards) or category-specific condition UI.

Add to collection opens the add sheet with prefilled catalog data; pick condition, variant, folder, optional purchase price, then save. If you already own the item, quantity and sell flows apply as offered.

Add from Collection → Add: image lookup where supported, search by name, condition (including graded options), optional purchase price and folder, then save.

Recent builds polish add-to-collection from scanner and product flows, including safe-area and scroll behavior so primary actions stay clear of the home indicator.

CSV import (when enabled): bring an existing spreadsheet from another tool — you don't have to re-enter your whole collection. Map columns, preview matching, confirm bulk import, resolve duplicates per app messaging.

Import scans (browser): on desktop, Collection → Import scans opens the Desktop Scan Station for bulk-importing card scans.

List for sale from a collection item — listing is prefilled from condition, variant, and catalog links; fixed price vs offer-only where supported.

Export CSV (Plus / Pro): download your full collection — or a single folder — as a spreadsheet with product name, set, card number, condition, variant, quantity, purchase price, current market value, gain/loss, notes, and date added.

Requires a physical iOS or Android device with a dev client or store build that includes camera + on-device OCR. Scanning with a camera is not available in the browser — on desktop, use the Desktop Scan Station instead. Read build requirements →

Single mode: Point the camera at a card; when a match is found, a sheet shows the best match and alternates. Open a full match list or manual catalog search. Manual search uses catalog-first typing; broader API search only after explicit Search / Enter, and only if the catalog returned no rows.

Batch mode: Scan in sequence; thumbnails appear along the bottom with remove controls; Review is placed so it does not overlap thumbnails. The scanner pauses while pickers and sheets are open. On the batch review screen, set condition (including graded grades), variant, folder, see approximate prices per row where data exists, change match from the thumbnail, remove rows, then add all to collection.

Photo mode: tap the shutter instead of holding the card steady — a single fast capture, read and matched on the spot. Tap anywhere on the preview to refocus if the card looks soft.

Capture and go: in batch mode the camera stays live between shots — capture, move the card aside, capture the next. Tiles caption themselves as they resolve, and a scan that could not be read shows up as an error tile you can retake or fix by hand, rather than quietly going missing.

Smarter matching: the card number is the dominant signal and is weighed together with the name, so a clean number on an awkwardly lit name still lands. Rank suffixes (V, VMAX, ex, GX and friends) count as part of the card’s identity instead of noise, sibling variants — stamps, reverse holos, alternate printings — are disambiguated rather than guessed between, and sealed products are excluded from card matching, so a booster box returns no match instead of a confident wrong card.

Cost: Scanning is free for every account — no separate scanner fee.

Scanner & search FAQ →

Got a flatbed or feed scanner and a stack of cards? Open app.lootscout.io on a computer and go to Collection → Import scans. Drop in your scan images — fronts, or fronts and backs together — and LootScout reads every card in your browser. Images are only uploaded when you list a card for sale. Up to 150 scans per import.

Each scan is matched to the catalog and lands in a review grid: confirm the match or search for a different one, set printing and condition (including graded), see the market price next to the price you are asking, and pick a folder. Then add to collection or add and list for sale in one pass — listings from the station go out under your shop profile, and the front and back scans attach to each listing automatically.

eBay & TCGplayer CSV export (Pro Shop / Enterprise): export the same reviewed batch as a ready-to-upload eBay File Exchange file or a TCGplayer seller file, with your own scan photos attached. The shop dashboard can export your existing inventory to the same two formats. It replaces the manual work of bulk listing — no retyping a card into another tool.

The TCGplayer file carries real seller-portal SKUs — the exporter resolves each row’s product, condition, and printing to the SKU TCGplayer itself uses, so the upload matches your existing portal rows instead of creating near-duplicates. Coverage is strongest on Magic, Pokémon, and Yu-Gi-Oh!; a row whose SKU cannot be resolved is skipped with a notice rather than exported against a guessed id. The eBay file uses your listing’s inventory SKU as its CustomLabel.

It runs on your phone too. The Scan Station is no longer desktop-only: open it on a phone and the same import, review, add, list, and export flow works, reading scans with your device’s own on-device text recognition and handing exports off through the share sheet.

Create listings from collection or listing flows. Fixed vs offer types; auto-price tracks catalog prices until you manually override.

Sale confirmations: in-person deals are confirmed by both parties; either side can propose a final price, and unresolved confirmations auto-time-out after 72 hours to keep your listings unblocked.

Reviews: after a confirmed sale or trade, each party can leave a 1-5 star review. Reviews show on the counterparty’s public profile and on shop pages.

Transaction disputes: if something goes wrong with a confirmed deal, open a dispute. Both parties exchange messages; if you can’t resolve it together, escalate to LootScout and a moderator will mediate.

Inventory SKUs from your folders: every listing is issued a sequential SKU the moment it is created, built from the name of the collection folder the item lives in — a card filed under Pokemon Binder 3 lists as pokemon_binder_3-014, the next one -015. Nothing to number by hand and no gaps to keep track of. SKUs show on the listing, in shop inventory, and in exports — and only the owner can see them. Items with no folder fall back to an unfiled- prefix, which is why the bulk-listing flows ask you to pick a folder first.

Printable QR labels: print QR labels for your listings as a PDF — a nine-per-page US Letter sheet to cut by hand, or one label per page sized for a thermal label printer (2.25 × 1.25 in and 1.5 × 1 in presets, for Rollo / MUNBYN / DYMO / Phomemo-class printers). Stick one on a sleeve or toploader and anyone can scan straight to the listing — which is what makes the kiosk and pickup flows work on a table at a show. Printing runs from the mobile app.

Longer trendlines: product and listing sparklines now plot a persistent price history that extends beyond the trend window the source APIs report — so you can see how a card actually moved over weeks and months, not just the last seven days.

Events: find local card shows and meetups on the Events tab. Vendors can place themselves on an event so buyers browsing the show see their listed inventory and can find them in person. Shows that run on a schedule repeat as a series — a weekly show starts a fresh occurrence each week, so the listing stays current without anyone re-posting it.

Your shop page is public. Anyone you send your shop link to can open it and browse your listings without an account — no signup wall between a customer and your inventory. Sign-in is only needed to actually do something: message you, add items to a pickup cart, or follow the shop. Tap Share on your shop page to send the link anywhere — a bio, a group chat, a show flyer, a Facebook post — and there is a shortcut to your own shop from Home and Collection so it is always one tap away.

Pickup orders, end to end: a customer browsing your shop adds listings to a pickup cart and requests pickup. The request lands in your dashboard queue, where you can open it as a fully prefilled POS sale — add or remove items, edit amounts, apply a discount, then take cash or a card — and press Notify buyer when the order is ready, which pushes them a notification that opens straight to the order. Walk-ups at a kiosk work the same way without needing an account.

Also here: a shop-scoped pickup cart on device, the Pickup hub and checkout routes, the kiosk tablet flow with QR listings, and trade or sale drafts started by scanning a listing QR from any side of the deal.

Building a trade is quicker: either side of a trade can be collapsed down to its item count and running total, so a twenty-card offer no longer buries the controls — and you can add an entire collection folder at once instead of tapping through it card by card, with anything that could not be added (already in the draft, not listed for sale) reported back to you rather than silently dropped.

Tap to Pay: accept in-person contactless card payments with just your phone — no reader hardware. It’s powered by Stripe, and you’re paid directly to your own bank through Stripe Connect; LootScout never holds your funds and takes only a small per-transaction platform fee. Stripe’s card processing fee applies on top — both are seller-side, the buyer is never surcharged. Before you charge, the app shows you an estimate of what the card will cost you; the completed sale shows what it actually cost. Card payments settle trades and sales instantly (no separate confirm step), and refunds run in-app if a deal is disputed. Available on Android, and as Tap to Pay on iPhone on iOS.

Trade-in cart: any shop can run walk-in trade-ins. Search the full product catalog for what a customer brings in — any grading company, including ACE and TAG, plus half grades — set a per-item agreed price, take card payment for any remaining balance on the spot, and the items file automatically into your collection folders. Custom catalog entries (including custom grading slabs) and per-line quantity adjustments are supported.

Transactions CSV export (Pro Shop / Enterprise): from the shop dashboard, export your transactions for any date range with date, type, counterparty, line items, revenue, cost basis, gross profit, discount, cash difference, and event name — for accounting, taxes, or just clean records.

Inventory export to eBay / TCGplayer (Pro Shop / Enterprise): from the shop dashboard in a browser, export your inventory as an eBay File Exchange or TCGplayer seller file — the same exporters the Desktop Scan Station uses.

Profile shows public info, shop entry points, usage, and settings. Two payment paths: on iOS, the in-app upgrade flow uses Apple In-App Purchase (auto-renewable subscriptions with a 14-day free trial); on Android and on lootscout.io/pricing subscriptions go through Stripe. Restore Purchases is one tap away on iOS for users coming back after reinstall. Promo codes redeem via Apple’s native sheet on iOS (offer codes) or through the in-app promo input on Android / web.

Manage opens the App Store subscription screen for IAP customers, or the Stripe customer portal for everyone else.

Follow & discover collectors: Search for other collectors and shops by name and follow the ones you want to keep up with, so their new listings and activity stay on your radar. Public profiles show reviews and ratings from completed deals.

LootScout has zero tolerance for objectionable content or abusive behavior. Every user, listing, and message thread has a Report option from the menu — pick a reason, write a 30+ character summary, and optionally attach up to four evidence photos. Moderators triage open reports within 24 hours and act on them by removing content and, when warranted, suspending the account responsible.

Need someone gone from your feed immediately? Tap Block user from the profile menu. Their listings, reviews, and messages disappear from your view the moment you confirm — and the block also files an automatic moderation report so we see the signal. Manage your block list any time from Profile → Privacy & safety → Blocked users.

Content filtering runs on the things everyone can see. Slurs are rejected outright in usernames and messages — checked on the server, not just in the app, and normalized first so that swapped characters and lookalike letters do not sneak past. Ordinary words that merely contain a bad substring are allowlisted, so the filter does not trip over real place names and surnames. Suspended accounts also drop out of public search.

Price trend hints, market opportunities, portfolio analytics — availability depends on build and configuration.