Reverse email lookup tools can serve different purposes for different people, but at the end of the day, they accomplish one thing; looking up who's behind a specific email address.
The problem is though, nowadays, there are loads of reverse email lookup tools out there, all with their slight differences and pros and cons.
Meaning it can be rather difficult to decide on what's the right reverse email lookup tool for you.
Our goal of this article is to change that for you. In it, I'll be comparing and breaking down the top 5 reverse email lookup tools currently available.
Anywhere from no-code reverse email lookup tools that work in the browser, to developer-friendly APIs, or even Google Sheets extensions, and beyond...
We'll cover it all. Let's dive in.
1) Proxycurl: the best-automated API & enrichment option for reverse email lookups
This option is going to give you the most power and functionality to do about anything with it. It's certainly the best option if you need to do reverse email lookups at scale.
But, you need to be relatively technically inclined or have a software engineer available to integrate it with your applications.
It's an API that allows you to pull rich data about people and companies, but in this case, you could use the Reverse Email Lookup Endpoint. It works for both personal and work emails.
We actually have a Reverse Email Lookup demo here that walks you through the entire process of looking up who's behind an email address:
To show you an example, though, the following is a simple Python script that queries our Reverse Email Lookup Endpoint to search for who's behind an email address:
import json,requests
api_key = 'Your_API_Key_Here'
headers = {'Authorization': 'Bearer ' + api_key}
api_endpoint = 'https://nubela.co/proxycurl/api/linkedin/profile/resolve/email'
params = {
'lookup_depth': 'deep',
'email': '[email protected]',
'enrich_profile': 'enrich',
}
response = requests.get(api_endpoint, params=params, headers=headers)
result = response.json()
print(json.dumps(result, indent=2))
After you run that short Python script, you'll receive a response like the following:
The deep parameter scrapes live, and the enrich parameter pulls a bunch of information including:
- Full name
- Matching LinkedIn, Twitter (now X), or Facebook for any given email
- Profile picture
- Occupation
- Summary of their LinkedIn profile
- Headline of their LinkedIn profile
- Country, city, state
- Education, degree
- Personal numbers
- And more
Of course, there's not always a 100% match rate for all of those enrichment variables, but it often finds many of them (depending on the email address).
The costs start from $10 for 100 credits, and it costs 3 credits to look up an email address. $0.30 cents per email address, not bad at all.
You can create your account for free right here.
2) Spokeo: the simple subscription-based reverse email lookup option
Spokeo positions itself as a quick and easy solution for reverse email lookup, promising to unveil a plethora of information about the owner of an email address.
It claims to sift through billions of public records and databases, delivering results in seconds that include names, social profiles, and more.
It costs $0.95 to look up a single email, which starts a 7-day free trial that renews for $29.95 per month, and then that allows you unlimited searches.
While Spokeo advertises a dynamic technology that scours social media sites, online directories, public records, dating sites, and shopping sites, the depth and accuracy of the information retrieved can be questionable compared to other more sophisticated solutions on the market.
Moreover, the platform’s user interface and experience might not be as seamless and intuitive as those offered by its competitors (like Proxycurl).
The process of looking up an email address, although marketed as “quick and easy” with “one click” to gain insight, can sometimes be less straightforward than users might anticipate.
While Spokeo does offer a range of features and has been featured on notable media platforms, potential users might want to weigh their options carefully.
There are alternative reverse email lookup solutions available that may offer more comprehensive, accurate, and user-friendly experiences.
3) PeopleFinders: the mainstream choice, good for background searches
PeopleFinders presents itself as a convenient tool for performing reverse email lookups, promising users the ability to uncover more about the sender behind any email.
The platform claims to offer a quick and easy way to determine who's behind an email, and whether an email address is legitimate or part of a scam.
It too, like Spokeo, advertises a database containing billions of public records and information, including social handles and more.
The platform’s emphasis on data aggregation and its ability to analyze data to source an email address back to the actual owner might not be as unique or superior as it suggests.
Several other providers in the market offer similar, if not more advanced, features and capabilities.
It does seem however their real edge is background checks over everything else. I'm not sure how valuable that is for your use case.
When trying PeopleFinders for this blog post I actually wasn't able to get it to successfully reverse lookup any email addresses. I can at least say Spokeo and BeenVerified (below) worked.
Again, users might find that the platform’s promise to reveal a wealth of information, including social media profiles, online photos, real identifying information, contact information, criminal records, and more, may not always meet expectations.
PeopleFinders does provide a range of reverse lookup services, but I just don't see it standing out and having any real advantage over other solutions.
4) BeenVerified: A solid contender, also a bit of a mainstream choice, but works
BeenVerified, like the other two solutions above seems to be very one-time use focused.
They advertise keeping users "in-the-know" with billions of records. It offers many of the same data points as PeopleFinders and Spokeo:
This reverse email lookup tool was successful with the email I gave it, so I give it props for that.
Outside of that the results weren't too terribly impressive. Nonetheless, it could probably get the job done for you if you just need to use it one time and forget about it.
The problem is though, you have to create a subscription to get one single result -- even just to test it out:
I wasn't a big fan of that. I rarely like to make new subscriptions, especially before seeing the product work.
Anyways, it's an alright tool for what it does.
5) Sapiengraph: The best for businesses that need to enrich email addresses, easy to use
Sapiengraph is good for individuals or small businesses that want to do reverse lookups in bulk on a Google Spreadsheet.
The best part is while it has a credit-based usage system like Proxycurl, you can get started for free and it has more of a freemium aspect to it.
If you like it and want to continue using it after the 100 credit trial, subscriptions start at $49 per month and give you up to 12,500 formula uses.
Plus, it's powered by Proxycurl, so it's the same rich and accurate data you'd get from Proxycurl -- just in a little bit of a simpler medium (no coding required at all).
It's particularly useful for business purposes. It allows you to do things like build large prospecting lists all within the comfort of the Google ecosystem, and then you could export it as a .CSV.
If you want to look up an email (business or personal), you could use the Reverse Email Lookup formula to do it like so =SG_REVERSE_EMAIL_LOOKUP("[email protected]").
First, though, you'll need to create your Sapiengraph account (it's free, and you start with 100 trial credits).
Then, you'll install the Sapiengraph plugin and complete the rest of the installation instructions.
After you've successfully enabled Sapiengraph, you'll see this:
To use it with Google Sheets, you'll need to first insert a formula containing the desired business email:
Then click enter, and you'll see a LinkedIn profile URL is returned:
From that point, you can do a lot of things with that LinkedIn profile URL. For example, we can enrich that LinkedIn profile URL with the Person Profile Enrichment formula =SG_PERSON("https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnrmarty", "first_name"):
There are several different enrichment parameters you could use, such as:
- Full name
- Follower count
- Occupation
- Headline of LinkedIn profile
- Summary of LinkedIn profile
- Country
- City
- State
- Languages
- More (view all data specifications here)
All of that information is at your fingertips within Google Sheets -- zero programming is required. Not bad, huh?
Click here to create your account now for free and receive 100 free trial credits.
The Reverse Email Lookup Tool Comparison
Best for building powerful applications: Proxycurl
If you're looking to build your own reverse email lookup tool or design your own application, Proxycurl is the best choice here.
It's the most powerful one on this list, but you'll either need to be a software developer or know one to implement it at its full capacity.
You can create your account here to give it a test today.
Pricing: Free to create an account. $10 for 100 credits. Credits do not expire -- discounts are available for bulk rates and subscriptions. Endpoint pricing varies.
Best for a one-time use: Spokeo
Spokeo gets the job done. If you get a random email from someone and want to get behind knowing who it is, Spokeo is an easy tool to get it done quickly.
The data probably isn't the richest, and you're not going to be able to build any applications with it, but it'll work.
The only con is they require a subscription, so be aware.
Pricing: Subscription, $29.95 per month.
Best at background checks: PeopleFinders
PeopleFinders was entirely unable to find my reverse email, but after playing around with the tool it did work pretty well for background checks.
So while I can't recommend it for searching by email, if you're looking for a background check and you already have quite a bit of information; it may be the tool for you.
Pricing: Subscription, $29.99 per month.
Honorable mention: BeenVerified
BeenVerified is the best at nothing, but they do everything okay enough to get the job done.
It's good all around, and it'll likely get your reverse email search done, but like the other tools mentioned above does require a subscription.
Pricing: Subscription, $29.99 per month.
Best for businesses seeking a simple solution: Sapiengraph
Sapiengraph is a great tool for business owners. There are several different use cases, like enriching prospecting lists with reverse email lookups and beyond.
Plus, it requires zero coding and is super easy to use.
Click here to create your account for free now and get 100 trial credits.
Pricing: Free to create an account, 100 credit trial. After that, it uses subscription-based billing starting at $49 per month which gives you 12,500 credits per month or up to 12,500 different formula uses (pricing here).
The best overall: Proxycurl
If you're going to be doing several reverse email searches and you're looking for the most power, give Proxycurl a shot.
We're a little bit biased because we own Proxycurl (plus Sapiengraph) -- but we don't think you'll regret it.
You can use Proxycurl to build whatever reverse email lookup application you'd like. It could be as simple as a couple of lines of Python or as complex as an entirely new reverse email lookup competitor you want to release for sale.
It doesn't matter -- Proxycurl gives you the power to do that, and you can trust the data to be rich and accurate.
Click here to create your account right now and give Proxycurl a try
P.S. If you aren't technically inclined or don't have a software engineer employed at your business, consider giving Sapiengraph a spin instead for reverse email lookups (but it only works with business emails right now, Proxycurl works for both personal and business).
