GainScout

GainScout is the fastest way to take a first look at whether a piece of land in England could be a candidate for Biodiversity Net Gain, the planning rule that has developers paying landowners to make land better for nature.

One button, official data

Point the map at a field and press one button. GainScout reads that exact spot against official public government datasets and gives you a clear answer in seconds, with every finding's source and the date it was checked. Nothing is estimated and nothing is invented.

What every check reads

• Statutory designations: SSSI, SAC, SPA, Ramsar, national and local nature reserves
• Ancient woodland and priority habitats
• Agricultural land grade, with the best and most versatile farmland flagged
• Flood risk zones
• Green Belt, National Landscapes and conservation areas
• The Local Nature Recovery Strategy for the area
• Your buyer catchment: the planning authority and National Character Area the land sits in
• What developments in that authority have actually taken from the public register of gain sites
• Whether the habitat and the farmland grade together leave much room to improve, or little
• A warning when ground looks uncultivated or semi-natural, which can need a decision from Natural England before any work starts
• The registered gain sites near the land, the supply already competing nearby, and how many have had nothing allocated yet

Built for the job

• Save sites and track them from watching to in talks
• Add a walkover checklist that says what can be surveyed this month, plus notes and timestamped evidence photos
• Create a dated report with findings, sources, your photos and an OS grid reference, ready to hand to an agent, ecologist or buyer, and export it as a PDF
• Works on iPhone, iPad and Mac, with sites, reports and photos synced through your own iCloud
• With Pro: Area Scan to rank the most promising spots across an area, draw your parcel for instant acreage and a spot by spot check, browse every registered gain site near any land, and compare saved sites side by side

Free to try, pay for what you need

Free accounts get 3 land checks a week, 3 saved sites and their first report free. While GainScout is in beta, until 31 December 2026, that is 5 checks a week, 5 saved sites, 2 extra free reports and one Area Scan a week. Buy reports one at a time or ten at once, or subscribe to GainScout Pro for unlimited checks, reports and saved sites plus every Pro tool, billed monthly, quarterly or yearly, cancel any time.