A grade your hive actually earned.
Propolize won't average away a queenless, robbed colony into a "GOOD." If something's wrong when you close the box, the score says so — every time, not just when you remember to check.
Queen not seen. No eggs. Robbing observed. A fresh inspection alone used to be enough to push the grade up — now a severe finding caps it outright, no matter how recently you checked.
Most beekeeping apps are optimistic. Yours doesn't need to be.
A score that goes up because you logged something recent, an AI advisor that never changes its answer, a mite count that's really just a guess dressed up as a number — these are the small dishonesties that make beekeepers stop trusting the app, then stop opening it. Propolize was built the other way: every number on screen is either something you entered, something a real weather or regulatory source reported, or something a vision model actually detected in your photo — boxed, countable, and visible on the image itself.
No account to start. Your apiary lives on your device from the first inspection.
No score that rises just because you tapped save. Severity caps the grade before recency can average it away.
No mite count you can't verify. Detected bees and mites are boxed on your own photo, not summarized into a single guess.
No silent diagnosis. A suspected reportable disease says so plainly, and tells you to call a certified inspector before it tells you anything else.
Organized the way a hive year actually runs.
Propolize's own mite-threshold logic follows four seasonal phases. So does the feature set below — because a beekeeper's real problems in March aren't the ones they have in September.
Overwintering check-ins
Light-touch guidance for cluster movement, hefting for stores, and clearing dead-out entrances — without fully opening a hive that needs to stay closed.
Inspection records that survive the field
Voice-logged findings, structured brood and queen status, and drafts that persist through a dropped signal or a reload you didn't ask for.
Mite counts, and treatments that expire on time
Real bounding-box detection on your sample photo, a threshold trend from your own logged history, and a pre-harvest-interval countdown once you've treated.
Winterizing guidance, on time
Feeding windows, a final mite check before winter bees are reared, and jurisdiction-aware compliance notes for eleven U.S. states so far.
The parts worth being specific about.
Accounts required to log your first inspection. Guest data lives on-device, not on a server you have to trust.
U.S. states with individually researched apiary registration rules, each dated to when it was last verified — the rest fall back to the national NASDA directory.
Severity findings — queenlessness, robbing, and foulbrood signs among them — that cap the health grade outright, regardless of how the other pillars score.
Everything you need to know about Propolize.
What is Propolize?
Propolize is a free, open-source beekeeping companion app designed for field reliability. It provides severity-capped hive health scoring, computer-vision Varroa destructor mite detection from sample photos, voice-guided inspection logging, seasonal Integrated Pest Management (IPM) workflows based on Honey Bee Health Coalition (HBHC) thresholds, treatment pre-harvest interval (PHI) tracking, and jurisdiction-aware regulatory compliance for U.S. beekeepers.
How does Propolize detect Varroa mites?
Propolize uses computer vision to detect and count Varroa mites and honey bees in your sample photos. Each detected mite and bee is highlighted with a bounding box directly on the image itself, allowing you to visually verify every count rather than trusting an opaque number.
What seasonal mite thresholds does Propolize use?
Propolize follows the Honey Bee Health Coalition (HBHC) 7th Edition seasonal thresholds: 1% during Dormant (Dec–Feb), 2% during Increase (Mar–May), 3% during Peak (Jun–Aug), and 2% during Decrease (Sep–Nov). When mite counts approach or breach these limits, the app suggests specific, temperature-gated IPM treatments.
How does severity-capped hive health scoring work?
Traditional apps increase scores simply because you opened a hive and logged a check-in. Propolize uses hard severity caps: four critical findings (queenlessness, lack of eggs, active robbing, and foulbrood symptoms) cap your grade (e.g. max 450/1000 "Action Required") regardless of how high other sub-scores are. You get an accurate score your hive actually earned.
Does Propolize require an account or internet connection?
No. Propolize is a local-first Progressive Web App (PWA). All your apiaries, hives, inspections, and treatments live on your device in localStorage and IndexedDB. You can conduct full voice-guided inspections and calculate syrup ratios completely offline in remote yards.
How does Propolize handle state apiary compliance?
Propolize contains individually researched registration rules, fees, and contact info for 11 U.S. states (including Florida, California, Texas, Pennsylvania, and Georgia), with last-verified dates. All other states link automatically to the official NASDA national directory.