The best email search sites and address directories allow you to easily find the information you are looking to obtain. They can give you access to phone numbers, addresses, emails, social media, and more belonging to an individual.
Searching for people online? Looking for an email address? Find friends old and new, as well as business contacts, with these email address directories and people search engines. This list of best email search sites and address directories are your best bets for finding an email address.
1. Pipl
What We Like:
- Searches conducted in real time
- Connects publicly available online and offline information from more than a million sources
What We Don’t Like:
- Search is too broad and random if all you have is a name
- Subscriptions are expensive
Pipl scours databases and directories such as ICQ, Amazon profiles, Flickr, or SEC records in real time to find information and people web search engines do not see.
2. Intelius
What We Like:
- Thorough, accurate reports
- Plans offer unlimited monthly searches
- Tiered pricing is reasonable
What We Don’t Like:
- Thoroughness depends on the tiered subscription you get
- Search results can be inconsistent
- Can’t download reports
By accessing public records, Intelius provides comprehensive email address searches for the U.S. It can reveal the person behind an email address, too.
3. LinkedIn
What We Like:
- One of the most popular professional networks, with more than 690 million users worldwide
- Robust profile creation tools
- Ability to search by a person’s skills
What We Don’t Like:
- Customer service needs improvement
- Profiles can be easily faked
- First-time profile setup can be overwhelming
LinkedIn’s worldwide network of professionals can be searched by name, industry, company, region, and more. It also offers a means to get in touch with the people you find.
4. LexisNexis Public Records
What We Like:
- 84 billion public records from over 10,000 sources
- Great for conducting litigation discovery
- Continuously updated
What We Don’t Like:
- Geared more toward legal professionals
For serious research, LexisNexis’s public records and private database covers hundreds of millions of people and businesses.
5. PeopleSmart
What We Like:
- Offers a variety of information
- Offers several ways to find people
- Easy to use
What We Don’t Like:
- Reports can be difficult to browse
- Accuracy can be hit or miss
- Can’t download reports
PeopleSmart can reveal a prospect’s company, email address, industry, revenue, and more to help you craft a message to that person. In addition, PeopleSmart can look up the person behind an email address in a reverse email search.
6. Facebook
What We Like:
- Find personal info not included in most background checks
- Robust filtering options
- Massive user base
What We Don’t Like:
- Many profiles are set to private
- Massive user base means too many results to browse
- Information can be inaccurate
You can search for people on Facebook (and just about everybody is on Facebook) by college, company, school, or name.
7. Yasni
What We Like:
- Aggregates search results from external sources
- Receive new search results by email
- Free search option on homepage for publicly available information
What We Don’t Like:
- Needs better SEO
- Privacy issues
Yasni scours social networks, the web, blogs, Amazon wishlists, and its own records for whomever you seek. To get you started, Yasni allows you to do a free cursory search on its homepage for publicly available information.
8. FreshAddress
What We Like:
- Remove bouncing email addresses, disposable domains, and more
- Keeps email lists up-to-date
- Offers free email list cleanup tool
What We Don’t Like:
- Marketing focused
- Doesn’t offer the in-depth information other sites provide
FreshAddress links old and new email addresses, but its always up-to-date database can also be searched for other criteria.
9. EmailSherlock
What We Like:
- Reverse email search
- It’s free
- Searches popular email services and social media
What We Don’t Like:
- In-depth info costs money
- Redirects to third-party site for background info
EmailSherlock smartly searches directories, public records, and web services such as online calendars to return data and details about the person behind an email address.
10. Spokeo
What We Like:
- Easy to use
- Inexpensive subscription options
- Good for finding a person’s social media accounts
What We Don’t Like:
- Background info is lacking
- Work history not included in reports
- Site aggressively upsells features
Spokeo’s reverse email search shows you the name, photos, videos, social networking profiles, blogs, and non-email contact information behind an email address.
[Source: This article was originally published in www.lifewire.com ]