2026.09.0 — Macintosh: a new name for versions, and a name for the bot
Two things worth knowing about this release. Version numbers now tell you when your app is from, and the assistant that identifies your items has a name: RTC Bot. If you have ever photographed something obscure and got back an empty form to fill in by hand, the second half of this post is the one for you.
Versions now say when, not how many
Until now releases were numbered the way software usually is: v3, v5.4, and so on. The trouble with that is it tells you nothing useful. If a friend says they are on v5.2 and you are on v5.4, neither of you knows whether that is a week apart or half a year.
From here on, a release is dated. This one is 2026.09.0 — the first release of September 2026. The year, then the month, then which release of that month it is. Glance at it and you know roughly how current you are, which is the only thing most people ever wanted from a version number.
Each era of the product also carries a codename, borrowed from computing history. This is Generation I — Macintosh. Written out in full, the release is RetroTechCollector 2026.09.0 — Macintosh.
A generation covers several releases and only changes when the product genuinely moves on to something new, so expect the date to tick along monthly and the codename to sit still for a good while. Later generations are named for other machines that mattered — Amiga, Atari, Sinclair, Commodore, Nintendo, DOS, Acorn, NeXT, PowerPC.
To be perfectly clear: these are affectionate nods to old hardware and nothing more. We are not affiliated with, sponsored by or endorsed by any of the manufacturers behind those names.
You will find the version and build number under Settings, near the bottom. That is the thing to quote if you ever report a problem.
Meet RTC Bot
The bit of the app that looks at your photo and works out what you have got now has a name. It is RTC Bot, and you will see it named wherever it does something: Identify with RTC Bot on the Add screen, "RTC Bot identified it" when it has, and a plain warning that RTC Bot can make mistakes, because it can. Always give the match a look before you save.
Nothing about your allowance changed. The monthly identifications on your plan are the same as they were, and they are still listed as AI identifications in your subscription settings.
No more blank entries for rare things
This is the real change. Photograph an item, and RTC Bot reads the labels, box art and model numbers, then looks for it in the catalogue.
Most of the time it finds it and you are done. But some of what you own has never been catalogued by anybody — an odd peripheral, a regional variant, something that only ever sold a few thousand units. Previously, that outcome handed you an empty form and left you to type everything yourself, which is a poor reward for owning something interesting.
Now, when RTC Bot has identified your item but the catalogue has nothing to match it to, adding it fills in what it found: the name, the maker, the model number and the year, plus a written description and a reference photo pulled from an online reference source. Your item arrives with something in it.
Two things worth being clear about. The reference photo is a stock image from a public reference source, not the photo you took — your own photos are still yours to add, and they are the ones that show your actual copy, with its actual scuffs. And the description is a shared catalogue description, so it becomes part of the entry everyone sees. Anything personal about your copy belongs in your own notes.
The add button says what it does
The action that adds an identified item used to call itself "Add it manually", which was never true — the form was already filled in for you. It now leads, and it is named for what filled it in. It only says "manually" where nothing was identified at all and you really are starting from scratch.
Small thing, but it was quietly telling people that the fast route was the slow one. More in Adding items.
Descriptions on everything
Description used to be a games-only field, which never made much sense. Every category can carry one now — computers, consoles, handhelds, accessories, the lot. If you have wanted somewhere to explain what a thing actually is, it is there.
Phone fixes
If you catalogue on a phone, you may have met a Save button that sat just past the edge of the screen and could not be reached or scrolled to. That is fixed, along with a couple of buttons in dialogs that came out the wrong size.
A note on plans
Nothing here is behind a paywall that was not before. RTC Bot identifications are on every plan — 20 a month on the free plan, 60 on Collector, 200 on Enthusiast — and condition grading likewise, at 3, 20 and 100. Selling stays 0% on every plan, there is no limit on items and no limit on listings, and the free plan keeps ten photos an item, three storage locations, export and full social.
The current position is always on Plans and billing.
What's next
The catalogue gets better every time somebody adds something that was not in it, which is now a great deal less work than it used to be. If RTC Bot gets something wrong, or gets something right that surprised you, we would like to hear about it. There is a Report a bug link in the app, or email [email protected].
Happy collecting.
— Josh