Have you ever found yourself thinking about an old friend from back in the day, say someone you graduated high school or college with, and wondering what they’re up to now and how you can find them? Well, you’re in luck if that sounds like you, as this is one of the many times that the Internet comes in clutch. All you need is a little piece of information about the person to go off, even if they’re a complete stranger you met at the bar or concert.
We’ve put together a list of the top 5 resources to assist you with finding anyone online. They are fast, reliable, and most importantly, user-friendly, and you can use them right away.
Whitepages
First up is Whitepages—America’s largest white-page phone book and directory—with millions of individual records nationwide. Launched in 1997, this website boasts well over 55 million searches per month. One factor that accounts for this is its clean and user-friendly interface, which users claim helps them search for people with ease.
Another important aspect is the fact that the site provides accurate and up-to-date information culled from many diverse sources, such as public records, telecom companies, and property deeds. This reliability guarantees that you can rely on the data you get from your searches. Its additional multi-search option under the paid plan grants you access to contact information, social media, and background checks, even on your mobile device.
What’s more, Whitepages customer support is available round the clock to help you resolve any issues that may arise. As a side note, the free search functionality has limited features—meaning that you need to upgrade your plan to find the results you didn’t find for free.
Next up is Facebook, a social networking giant with over 3 billion monthly active users. On this platform, there’s a pretty good chance to find anybody since most people have an account on it. You just need their full name and additional details like phone number, email address, city, or school name. To begin:
- Visit the Facebook website or open the Facebook app on your phone and sign in with your account details. Register if you’re a new user.
- Go through the profiles that match your criteria and look at the profile pictures, mutual friends, and any other information that helps determine if it’s the person you’re looking for.
- If you have found the right person, just click the “Add Friend” button on their profile to send them an invite. Alternatively, you can send them a message.
- If you have mutual friends with the person, you can even ask them to help you in connecting with them.
Remember that not everybody has their profiles set to public, so a user’s personal information like photos, statuses, and posts might not be visible until they accept your invitation.
Nuwber
This website appeals to those looking for an efficient, no-fuss, and cost-effective people search solution. Nuwber offers instant access to the details of more than 300 million people resident in 50 U.S. states, including their phone numbers, addresses, social profiles, criminal records, financial data, and business information. Its reverse lookup functionalities give you the option to search by name, phone number, address, or email.
Generally, the results are highly accurate and exhaustive, owing to the hundreds of millions of records the search engine crawls from public records, business directories, and social media platforms.
Therefore, whether you want to get back in touch with your old buddies, verify unknown callers, look up your neighbors, research property sellers, trace lost relatives, or ensure your date is genuine, Nuwber has got you covered.
Google Search
Google is a good way to find people online, as it’s the default search engine for most internet users. It’s also the first choice people turn to when they need to find someone. The platform has several search options, such as web, image, video, news, and maps, so you can conduct broad searches that reach all parts of the web. You can use a name, phone number, or email address as your search term and then filter the results using location and sources.
However, remember that Google’s search results might not always be as organized or extensive as those offered by specialized search tools. A search may also lead to the discovery of false positives or unrelated data. Therefore, verify the identity of people in such results.
Completing our list is LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional-oriented social networking platform, which is a remarkable choice if you’re looking to find people in a business environment. The platform hosts more than 1 billion members, people’s current and past job positions, academic credentials, and professional skills, among others, all readily accessible for any registered user to view.
This implies that you can use it to find business associates, current and former colleagues, suppliers, clients, and even job applicants. To begin, type the person’s name in the search bar on the site or mobile app, and then apply location, posts, events, and industry filters to your search in order to refine the results.
Even though LinkedIn’s search algorithms may not always return the most accurate results and you may find incomplete profiles or outdated information, it’s still worth a try, as this platform is used by many people.
Conclusion
In short, finding people online is relatively simple with the right knowledge. All platforms on our list enable you to easily and accurately perform a people search and get a vast amount of information quickly. Nevertheless, the one that suits you the best will finally depend on your specific needs, budget, and tastes. Therefore, go ahead and do your homework and pick carefully.