Press release ·
From the shelf to the database: computer scientist from Ibbenbüren launches BrickDb, a free platform for LEGO® collectors
A catalogue of more than 20,000 sets, a collection kept copy by copy, a scanner for minifigure bags and honestly calculated prices – in the browser on 15 country sites and as an app for Android, iPhone and iPad, Mac, Windows and Fire tablets, in seven languages
Ibbenbüren, Germany, 7 November 2026 – What is actually on the shelf, in what condition, and what is it worth today? That question is where computer scientist Thimo Buchheister from Ibbenbüren in north-west Germany started building BrickDb in September 2026 – together with his wife Andrea, who looks after social media and the community. It has since become a free platform for everyone who collects LEGO®: a catalogue of 20,411 sets, 17,363 minifigures and 64,955 distinct parts from 496 themes, a collection manager, scanners for minifigure bags and set boxes, and a valuation that shows how it was arrived at. With version 1.0, BrickDb runs in the browser at www.brickdb.net and as an app in the stores of Google, Apple, Microsoft and Amazon – and, as of recently, on the Mac too. It is published by ThreeB IT GmbH of Ibbenbüren, the company Buchheister runs together with Thorsten Brügge.
From a first Technic set to a LEGO room of their own
Thimo Buchheister always kept the LEGO bricks from his childhood. But the collection only really began after the "Dark Ages", as fans call the years without LEGO: at 18, on holiday in Denmark, he bought a single LEGO Technic set, and from then on the collection grew. A few years later he visited LEGOLAND Billund with his wife Andrea. To this day he teases her that back then she thought the collectible minifigures were silly and talked him out of buying the heavily discounted box. Today she is one of the series' biggest fans, and the two of them own almost every collectible minifigure there is.
During the pandemic the two gave up their living room and turned it into a LEGO room of their own, where they build and display their collection. By now the collection has outgrown that room too, and part of it is kept in a larger rented storage unit. Professionally, Buchheister is at home in the digital world: the computer scientist (University of Münster) has been founder and CEO of ThreeB IT GmbH since February 2019, a small software company in Ibbenbüren that works mainly with .NET, Microsoft Azure and DevOps.
Why BrickDb exists
At first the two wanted to manage their collection with the tools that already exist online. But those were either full of advertising, or you needed several of them that were not connected to each other, or they neither looked nor felt modern. And their own Excel spreadsheet could no longer cope with a collection like this: a spreadsheet records what you own. It cannot tell you that one set number stands for four copies in four different conditions, that the second one is missing three parts, which box it is in, or what each of them is worth this month. So Thimo Buchheister built BrickDb: a platform that answers those questions in one place – without anybody having to sign in just to be allowed to see something.
"I wanted to know what is on my shelf and what it is really worth – not as a number that comes from somewhere, but together with the sales it was calculated from. Nothing quite like that existed, so I built it myself. And because it helped me, everybody should be able to use it for free." – Thimo Buchheister, founder of BrickDb
What BrickDb does
- Catalogue: sets, minifigures, parts, books, magazines, merchandise, video games and board games in one place. Every set page lists, colour by colour, the parts the set is made of. The catalogue data is refreshed every night from Rebrickable's published data.
- Scanners: the camera reads the square DataMatrix code on collectible minifigure bags and tells you which figure is inside – handy at any brick fair. A second scanner reads the barcode on a set box, and a third identifies a minifigure from a photo, checks its parts and names missing accessories.
- Collectible minifigures: every series at a glance, with the current value of each figure and the figures still missing from your own collection – made for your phone at the next brick fair.
- A collection kept copy by copy: every single copy is recorded with its condition, your own photos and the price you paid. Condition is a profile rather than a school grade, so that a sealed box and a complete but well-played build do not end up meaning the same thing. Storage places – rooms, shelves and boxes – record where every copy is kept. Collections can be shared with others and, if you wish, published.
- Quick to bring in: if you keep your sets on Rebrickable, you can bring them all over at once. Up to 50 photos of set boxes can be uploaded at the same time; BrickDb reads every set number, and each copy is confirmed before it is added.
- Build check: BrickDb compares a set's parts list with all the parts you own and tells you how much of it you could build today – and which parts are still missing.
- Prices, deals and wishlist: every set page compares the shops' current prices with the recommended retail price and shows the price history; a page of its own collects the sets offered furthest below their recommended price. If the price of a set on your wishlist drops, BrickDb lets you know.
- Notifications: new in version 1.0, BrickDb tells you by push notification and e-mail when somebody shares a collection or support replies – and, if you want, when new sets appear in a theme you follow or a fan event is coming up in your country.
- Creative tools: a photo mosaic turns a picture into a mosaic in colours that really exist as bricks, with a parts list and building instructions; the photo never leaves your device. The creative mosaic can fill areas using only parts from your own collection and delivers the instructions step by step or as a PDF booklet. There are also QR codes built from bricks and a gallery for your own creations (MOCs).
- Out and about: upcoming fan events and exhibitions, every LEGOLAND park with opening hours and live waiting times, and a finder for LEGO shops nearby.
Honestly calculated prices instead of bare numbers
A core principle of BrickDb is that a price never stands alone. Valuations are based on sales BrickDb recorded itself – each with its date, its currency and whether tax was included. What you see is the median, the range around it and the number of sales it was calculated from. Below five sales, BrickDb says that it does not know the value rather than showing a number it cannot stand behind. The data comes from licensed interfaces and published product feeds, among them BrickLink, Brickset and eBay – never from reading other people's websites without asking.
The technology: one codebase for the web and four app stores
BrickDb is written in C# on .NET throughout. The website is a Blazor application; the apps for Android, iPhone and iPad, the Mac, Windows and Amazon's Fire tablets are built with .NET MAUI from the same codebase and share their user interface with the website. The platform runs on Microsoft Azure, at its core in the German region Germany West Central (Frankfurt am Main), on Azure Container Apps and Azure SQL.
- Scanning: DataMatrix codes and barcodes are read with the open-source library ZXing.Net. For live minifigure recognition, a compact neural network in ONNX format runs directly on the device – in the browser via WebAssembly, natively in the apps. Only once the figure holds still is a single cut-out of the picture sent for identification.
- Offline: if somebody changes their collection in the app without a connection, the app holds on to the change and sends it as soon as the device is back online.
- AI assistants: through its own MCP server (Model Context Protocol), assistants such as Claude, ChatGPT or Copilot can search the catalogue and – once signed in – work with your own collection.
- Foldables: on foldable phones the app shows the list and the result side by side; the scanner and the mosaic designer make use of the half-open tabletop posture.
- 15 country sites, seven languages: from www.brickdb.de via www.brickdb.at, www.brickdb.ch, www.brickdb.co.uk and www.brickdb.fr to www.brickdb.us, every country has an address of its own with prices and shops for its own market. The interface is available in German, English, French, Dutch, Danish, Italian and Spanish.
Privacy from the start
The catalogue, search, scanners and prices can be used without an account. You only need one to keep a collection or a wishlist of your own; you can sign in with an e-mail address and password, or with Google, Apple or a Microsoft account. Usage statistics are only collected once a visitor has explicitly agreed. Anyone with an account can download all of their own data and delete the account at any time, by themselves.
Availability and price
BrickDb is free to use, with no subscription, in the browser at www.brickdb.net and as an app on Google Play, in Apple's App Store (iPhone, iPad and Mac), in the Microsoft Store and in the Amazon Appstore. BrickDb sells nothing. It is funded through affiliate links to shops that are labelled as "Advertising" on the page – buying through them costs you nothing extra – and through voluntary support.
About BrickDb
BrickDb is an independent, fan-made catalogue and collection manager for LEGO® sets, minifigures and parts. Thimo Buchheister started the platform in Ibbenbüren, Germany, in September 2026; it is published by ThreeB IT GmbH, which he runs together with Thorsten Brügge. He runs BrickDb together with his wife Andrea Buchheister, who takes on most of the social media and community work; Thorsten Brügge designs the interface. BrickDb is free, available on the web at www.brickdb.net and 14 further country sites, and as an app for Android, iPhone and iPad, Mac, Windows and Fire tablets.
Press contact
Thimo Buchheister
ThreeB IT GmbH
Bergstrang 105
49479 Ibbenbüren
Germany
Telephone: +49 5451 893922-0
E-mail: press@brickdb.net
Web: www.brickdb.net · Press area: www.brickdb.net/about/press
Images (logo) and this release as a PDF can be downloaded from the press area.
LEGO® is a trademark of the LEGO Group. BrickDb is not sponsored, authorised or endorsed by the LEGO Group.