Home → Item Cataloging and Holdings Management → Item Actions → Item Inventory
5.1. Item Inventory
Last Updated 01/08/2026
Conducting an Inventory of Your Collection
On This Page
To conduct an inventory of a collection or part of a collection in Evergreen, staff first add inventory dates to all items on the shelves in the section of the collection being inventoried, then run reports to see if any items that should have been inventoried were missed. There are two methods of adding Inventory Dates: using a checkin modifier or from the item status screen.
Words to Know
Checkin Modifier: A setting added to the Checkin screen that changes how the system processes an item when it is checked in
To conduct an inventory of a collection or part of a collection in Evergreen, staff first add inventory dates to all items on the shelves in the section of the collection being inventoried, then run reports to see if any items that should have been inventoried were missed.
There are two methods to adding inventory dates to items on the shelf.
Method One: Scan Individually
This method requires staff to use either a mobile scanner or a laptop with an attached scanner capable of being moved through the stacks. Once the scanning apparatus is set up, and the portion of the collection to be inventoried identified, follow these steps:
- In Evergreen, navigate to the check in screen.
- From the drop-down menu below the grid, select the Update Inventory checkin modifier.
- Scan the barcodes for each item on the shelf in the range you're inventorying. The date and time of the scan will be added as the inventory date to the item. Scanning in this way will not affect the status of the item.
Note: changing the Effective Date (backdating) will not change the Inventory Date.
Method Two: Update in Batch
If you are engaging in additional actions on materials that you will be inventorying, such as updating item attributes, you can load the items into the item status screen and update the inventory dates on all the items in the screen at once.
There are multiple ways to load the items into the Item Status screen:
- Scan the barcodes
- Upload a .CSV file of barcodes
- From an Item Bucket, select the items to view in the Item Status screen and choose "Open in Item Status"
Once items are in the Item Status screen, select Update Inventory from the Actions Menu.
Inventory On Checkin
When completing an inventory project, you may want to apply the Update Inventory checkin modifier when checking in items. This ensures that items that were checked out when a section was scanned but returned before running a report on missed items are not marked missing.
Inventory Report Templates
There are a number of report templates available in the Inventory and Weeding Templates and the Item Templates folders that can be used as part of the inventory process.
In the reports Interface, locate the Shared Folders. You can find the Inventory templates in the shared templates Folder labeled Admin.
- Find the Centralized Reports templates subfolder and expand it.
- Expand the Inventory and Weeding templates subfolder.
- Choose Counts if you're looking for a list with circulation counts.
- Choose Lists if you're looking for a shelf list.
- Clone any templates you wish to use.
- Run your report(s).