Alerts

The Alerts tab shows only dated items, grouped by urgency. Its header is the Stock tab's: the title names the session — "Alerts: Personal" — and its menu switches it; the Search an item field filters the alerts and the "To buy again" list by product name.

The groups

The red badge on the tab counts everything except Upcoming, which is not an alert: it is context.

Use by, or best before

Every expiry date carries its meaning, chosen on the batch (and set by itself by reading the date when the packaging says so):

• Use by — a safety limit. Once passed, the item is Expired, in red.
• Best before — a promise of quality. Once passed, the item is not dangerous, just not as good: it moves to Best-before passed, in orange, and the reminder says "taste it". Never red.

Unless you choose otherwise, a date is a use-by date.

To buy again

In an item's sheet, Restock › Warn when fewer than… are left sets a threshold. As soon as the total quantity drops below it, the product shows up here, with what is left and what is missing, and counts in the badge. The group's ⋯ button:

• Share the list: the shopping list as text, one line per product;
• Add to Reminders: one reminder per product in your default list of the Reminders app — permission is asked at that moment, and the app reads nothing there;
• AI: the list sent to the assistant with the sentence of your choice.

Without a threshold, an empty product asks for nothing.

What does not raise an alert

An item with nothing left no longer appears in alerts, even expired: there is nothing left to use before the date, so nothing to lose. It stays visible in Stock, at zero, so you remember to buy it again.

Items with no expiry date are not watched either.

The threshold

Alert settings, at the top of the tab, defines what "soon" means: 3, 7, 14 or 30 days. Seven by default.

This threshold only changes what this tab displays. The notification lead time is set separately, in Reminders.

Colours

Options › General sets how deadlines look in every list:

• Text colour: from how many days out the deadline line takes colour (7 by default), and which tint. An item already expired stays red.
• Background colour: from how many days out the row background lights up (3 by default), its tint, and its blinking (every 5 seconds; "None" for a steady background). "Never" turns the background off.
• Ring colour: the tint of the ring around each item's avatar.

A preview at the top of the screen shows the effect of the settings, and Restore the default values puts everything back.

Hiding what is far off

The Show upcoming items switch removes the last group, keeping only what needs action.

Selecting several alerts

Alert settings › Select Alerts, or a long press on a row then "Select", puts a checkbox in front of every batch. All ticks the whole list. The bottom bar acts on the selection:

• Move the batches to another location;
• Share: the list as text — name, quantity, location, deadline, one line per batch — to Notes, Messages, Mail or any app;
• AI: a request to the assistant, see below;
• Delete the batches, after a confirmation. The products stay in the stock, at zero.

Asking the assistant

The AI button offers your ready-made sentences — "Recipe - 6 ppl", "No waste", "Shopping" to begin with, up to eight, edited in Options › AI Assistant. Each has a short name, 16 characters at most, and a text. Your sentences follow you to your other devices through iCloud. The chosen sentence, followed by the list of selected batches, is sent to Apple Intelligence; the answer is written in a sheet, where it can be copied or shared.

The assistant is the Apple Intelligence model on the device: neither the list nor the answer leaves the phone. It needs a compatible device with Apple Intelligence turned on in Settings; otherwise the sheet offers to share the request — sentence and list — with the assistant of your choice, or to copy it.

On iOS 27, Options › AI Assistant may offer a second model, Private Cloud Compute: Apple's server model, stronger and more at ease with a long list. The request then goes to Apple's servers, encrypted and not retained; the answer says so at the bottom of the sheet. If the server does not answer, the device takes over — never the other way round.

Siri does not take text from apps: this model is what sits behind it, and it is the one the app queries directly.

The widget

On the Home Screen (long press, Edit, Add Widget, TrackInvent) and on the Lock Screen: the number of alerts, the next batches to expire with their due date and location, and the number of products to buy again. The small size shows the count and the most pressing batch; the medium size, three batches. Tapping the widget opens the Alerts tab.

By default the widget follows the session on display in the app. A long press on the widget, then Edit Widget, lets you pin it to a session — "Personal", "Work", "Cabin": it then stays on it whatever the app shows, and its header names it. Two widgets side by side can thus watch two stocks; tapping one opens the app on its session.

It refreshes on every save, then on its own at midnight — "expires tomorrow" becomes "expires today" without the app running. It reads a summary the app leaves on the device, one per session; nothing leaves the device, and it never opens iCloud. Until the app has been opened once, it says so.

Refreshing

Groups are recomputed when the day changes, without your having to reopen the app.