The quickest way in is the camera. There are three other ways, and which you want depends on what you’re holding.
Photograph the label
Tap the camera icon and choose Take Photo, or Choose from Library if you already snapped it in the shop.
Yarn Squirrel reads the label, searches Ravelry for the yarn, and keeps your photo for the stash entry. Pick the match and the weight, fibre, length per skein and gauge all come with it — you just add your colourway and how much you have.
This is the one to reach for when the ball is in your hand. See Scanning a yarn label for what it can and can’t read.
Search Ravelry
Type the yarn’s name instead, and pick it from the results. Same outcome as a scan, minus the photo — right for yarn you’ve already put away, or when you’re planning rather than unpacking.
This works whether or not you have a Ravelry account.
Nothing found? The message points you at the Manual tab, which is the right answer for indie dyers and anything Ravelry has never heard of.
Another colourway of a yarn you already have
If you already own the yarn, you don’t need to describe it twice. There are two ways in, and both end up in the same yarn group.
From the group is quickest. Open the yarn in your stash and tap Add Colorway. The yarn itself is already known — weight, fibre, length per skein — so all you fill in is what’s different about this ball: the colourway, how much you have, and where you keep it.
For a yarn from Ravelry you can pick from that yarn’s known colourways, or turn on Enter custom colorway and type your own — useful for a shade Ravelry hasn’t got, or a name only your dyer uses.
From the add sheet, the My Yarns tab does the same thing starting from the list of yarn you own. If your stash is empty it says so, because there’s nothing to add a colourway to yet.
Either way, care instructions you’ve already recorded come along automatically, so you don’t enter them again.
Dye lot has a field of its own when the yarn is one you added by hand. For a yarn that came from Ravelry, add the new colourway first and then edit the entry to record the dye lot — worth doing if you’re buying several balls to use together.
Manual
Type it in yourself: name, brand, colourway, how much, and as much or little of the rest as you feel like. Good for handspun, mill ends, a gift with no label, or anything you simply can’t find.
A photo you took on the way in comes with you to this tab, so switching here after a failed search doesn’t waste it.