Minimum quantity and low stock

Tell InvenDo how many of something you always want to have — six eggs, two rolls of toilet paper — and it flags the item as soon as you drop below that. A daily reminder tells you something is running low, and one screen collects everything that needs buying.

Set a minimum for an item

1. Tap the item in your Inventory (or open it with Edit). See Adding and editing items.

2. Enter a number in Minimum quantity, next to the quantity.

3. Tap ✓ to save.

The minimum belongs to the product, not to a single pack: if you keep milk in the fridge and the garage fridge, InvenDo adds both up and compares the total with the minimum. Leave the field empty or at 0 for things you don’t want to track.

An item is “low” as soon as its total drops below the minimum — six eggs with a minimum of six is fine; five is low. Low items show a small red min badge in the list — switch it on once under ⋮ → View Options → Show Fields → Minimum quantity; it stays hidden until you do.

Set a minimum for a whole category

Sometimes it’s the total that matters, not any single product — “at least 10 tins of anything in the Canned food category”. Open Manage → Categories, edit the category, switch on Minimum total quantity and enter the amount. The category then needs a unit, because everything in it is added up in that unit; InvenDo asks you to choose one if you haven’t. See Units and unit size. Subcategories count towards their parent.

A category that’s below its minimum shows the same red min badge on its header.

The Low Quantity Items screen

In either tab, open the ⋮ menu and tap Low Quantity Items. Tapping the daily low-stock reminder opens the same screen.

It has two parts:

• Categories below minimum — each with its current total against the minimum. Tap one to see what’s inside.
• Items below minimum — every product that’s under its own minimum, showing what you have, what you need, and how many are already on the Shopping List.

Tap the cart icon next to an item to add it to the Shopping List — you’ll be asked how many. See Using the Shopping List.

Add All to Shopping List

The Add All to Shopping List button at the bottom tops everything up in one go: for each low item it adds exactly what’s missing — the minimum, less what you have, less what’s already on the list — so running it twice never orders double. Categories that are low as a whole aren’t added automatically; pick the products yourself.

Add All to Shopping List is a Premium feature. Adding items one at a time is free.

The low-stock reminder

With reminders on, InvenDo sends one notification a day per list — Item quantity below the minimum! — whenever anything is under its minimum. Tapping it opens the Low Quantity Items screen. Switch it on or off under Settings → General → Show Notifications For → Minimum quantity; the time is set under Notification Time. See Expiry dates and notifications.

Good to know

• To hide the minimum-quantity field on a list you don’t use it for, untick Minimum quantity in Manage → Features and Fields. To hide it for one category only, untick it under Enabled fields when editing the category.
• Whether the minimum quantity and the min badge appear in the list is up to ⋮ → View Options → Show Fields → Minimum quantity — off by default, and independent of the feature itself. See Viewing and finding items.
• On a list someone shared with you, you can use Add All to Shopping List even without your own Premium subscription.