What you should know about phone number search!?

Finding someone’s phone number online is tricky. Though performing a reverse phone search is theoretically much more straightforward which just involves you entering a phone number in a Web page and learning the person's name and address.

Unfortunately, reverse cell phone lookups remains one of the few kinds of online searches that it's almost impossible to get for free.  Cell phone numbers are private—there’s no public directory of cell phone numbers to replace those old paper phone books. However, there are a few ways you can find someone’s phone number (and business phone numbers are still easy to find).

Finding a person's phone number using social media

The best way to look up someone based on a phone number right now is their social media accounts. That shouldn't surprise anyone based on the social media platforms spotty privacy record, but in this case it certainly works to your advantage if you're looking up a phone number. Just open any of the prominent social media platform  and enter a phone number in the search box at the top of the screen, then press Enter. If that individual has associated their phone number with their social media profile, they will appear as the top search result, regardless of their privacy settings and even if you are not friends.

Reverse phone lookup

There are still an online versions of those heavy paper phone books! But, like the physical books, it only covers landlines. However, that’s nothing to sneeze at.There are reverse phone lookup sites that gave excellent results with both landline and cell phone numbers. Just enter the phone number you want to reverse engineer and click search.These services are quite good at identifying the personal information of whoever is behind the phone number you enter. Often, though, it will simply announce that the information is unpublished.

If that person’s name and phone number would appear in a paper phone book in that geographical area, you’ll see it on some websites as well. It’s just like looking through paper phone books, with all the limitations—but it’s faster to search all those phone books, and all at once.

What if you can’t find a phone number on social media, or in the phone lookup sites? Well, then it becomes a lot tougher. This kind of information is generally kept private and is closely guarded. People don’t often post their phone numbers online and there’s no massive database of cell phone numbers and names you can access. Sure, you could try heading to Google or other search engines and searching for a person’s name along with “phone number”, but that will almost certainly not work. (Still, it’s worth a try, just in case.)

What can you do?

If you really need to call someone, you may be stuck asking for their phone number directly. If you know the person on social media, you could message them and ask them for their number. If you can’t find the person online, perhaps you can find someone who knows them and ask. For example, if you desperately needed to get in contact with someone, you might try finding a friend or relative on social media platforms and asking that person for their phone number.

What about business phone numbers?

Thankfully, it’s still very easy to find the phone numbers for businesses. Most businesses want you to call them, so they advertise their numbers very publicly. Customer support may be a bit harder to reach, of course.

Most businesses place their phone numbers in an easy place to find on their website. You can generally just head to the business’s website and click something like “Contact Us” or “Customer Service” to find it. Some smaller businesses—like that little local restaurant—may not even have websites, but will usually have social media pages. You’ll often find their phone number on their social media page, which many businesses just use as their main website.