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(Ad) What are the best background checks for quick, effortless, and trustworthy information that also guarantee privacy? There are various choices available, ranging from expensive to affordable background check reports.
Of course, you want to make sure that whatever option you choose offers a fair deal without taking advantage of you. If time is of the essence and convenience is key, our top recommendation would be BeenVerified.
8 Best Background Check Sites: At a Glance
- BeenVerified - Best for Public Records Search Overall
- PeopleLooker - Best for Quick Results
- TruthFinder - Honorary Pick for the Best Background Check Sites
- Intelius - Best Background Check Site for Quick Results
- Instant Checkmate - Best for Ease of Use
- PeopleFinders - Best Background Check Services for Site Source
- Spokeo - Best for Criminal & Traffic Records
- US Search - Best Background Check Site for Affordability
Best Background Check Sites for Reliable Results - In-Depth Review
When selecting the best background check sites, we took a variety of variables into consideration. The most important factors in our ranking process are pricing, speed, user evaluations, and features. Review our ranking system in depth by reading the parts below.
The greatest background check services are listed below along with a description of what makes them one of our top choices.
BeenVerified – Best for Public Records Search Overall
Advantages
- Outstanding for work history
- Inexpensive subscriptions
- Many choices for data input
- Search for unclaimed property
Disadvantages
- Cannot purchase a single report
- Before search results, a paywall
You may use BeenVerified to find any person in the US by doing a quick background check utilizing public data records. A name, address, phone number, email address, or social media account.
The website then displays a list of prospective matches for you, and you can obtain a detailed report for each person. Contact information, property records, criminal histories, and information from social media are all included in the report.
Unclaimed property searches are one more feature that BeenVerified provides that many other search tools don’t. To find out if a state has unclaimed money or property in someone's name, you can conduct a search for that person or yourself. Similar search features are available on the websites of most states, but if you already have a BeenVerified account, this is a great extra.
BeenVerified has the typical background check necessities, but we discovered that it excels at revealing job history. You cannot purchase a report for a single person on BeenVerified. Instead, you must subscribe for unlimited reports every month. You can pay for three months in advance or a recurring 1-month subscription.
The results are reliable, and the monthly rates are reasonable, which is precisely what we want from a background check service. BeenVerified is a good option if you want a product that handles all the essentials correctly.
If you choose to pay on a monthly basis, the cost of a subscription is $29.99 per month . But if you decide to pay for three months in advance, the price drops down to $19.49 per month for your membership fee.
PeopleLooker - Best Background Check Site for Quick Results
Advantages:
- User-friendly
- Provides detailed search reports
- Outstanding customer support
- Incorporates social media and genealogy search features
Disadvantages:
- Doesn’t provide individual reports
PeopleLooker is a web-based platform that collects data from various sources, such as public records, social media, and online directories, to provide comprehensive information about individuals. This website is user-friendly and offers multiple services, including address lookups, and background checks.
The precision of data offered by PeopleLooker may fluctuate based on several factors, including the origin of the information, the individual's privacy preferences, and the correctness of the data recorded in the public records.
The time required to obtain results from PeopleLooker can vary based on the type of check being conducted. For basic searches, such as people searches or address lookups, the results may be accessible almost immediately.
PeopleLooker follows a monthly subscription approach and offers a trial service for $1 for 7 days. If customers decide to continue, they can choose between two premium plans: a monthly membership priced at $23.99/month or a 3-month membership priced at $19.19/month .
TruthFinder - Best Background Check Site Overall
Advantages
- Background checks are endless
- Updated report monitoring add-on available
- Outstanding people-finding skills
Disadvantages
- Quite pricey in comparison to some of the other choices
TruthFinder provides a variety of background check options that include public sources.You can also search to see what information others may find out about you. Many of the capabilities that you might anticipate from other background check services are available with TruthFinder. This includes the ability to search for acquaintances and relatives of your search subject, including searches that include public sources.
You can even claim ownership of a particular report profile on TruthFinder and have the option to remove your information from appearing on their service. It excels as a person's search tool because TruthFinder can provide a lot of details about the person you're looking for. The capability to conduct an unlimited number of background checks with the purchase of a membership plan is another key strength.
The primary drawback of the TruthFinder monthly subscription is that it costs $28.05 , but if you use it frequently, it will be well worth the investment. Read this TruthFinder review to find out more about the service.
DISCLAIMER: You may not use TruthFinder or the information it provides to make decisions about consumer credit, employment, insurance, tenant screening, or any other purpose that would require FCRA compliance. TruthFinder does not provide consumer reports and is not a consumer reporting agency. (These terms have special meanings under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, 15 USC 1681 et seq., ("FCRA"), which are incorporated herein by reference.)"
Intelius - Best Background Check Site for Quick Results
Advantages
- Can include education history
- Effective visuals
- Can include social network profiles
Disadvantages
- Somewhat pricey in comparison to other options
Background checks performed by Intelius can be more thorough than others. It can provide education history in addition to the standard location history, criminal and traffic records, and financial records, useful information if you're attempting to utilize Intelius to contact someone from your past.
In particular, with Intelius you can use its service to check on someone's criminal or traffic history, search for contact information for former friends, and see what comes up in their background checks. You can also check the property information for the home you want. The service can provide you with the information you need quickly, and all searches are confidential so it won't be obvious what you looked for.
Six distinct background search options and four different membership plans, ranging from reverse phone number lookup searches to background checks, are available from Intelius. You must join up for a monthly subscription to use any of these, no matter which one you choose. Each plan has a comparable monthly membership fee, although the cost of the initial trial period varies.
In addition to having a large public record source, Intelius offers a user-friendly interface. Despite some rather perplexing billing procedures, this is one of the top site background check services.
The monthly membership option available for a People Search report is $24.86 per month, which should be reasonable given the quality Intelius is putting forth. For a bi-monthly plan, the cost is $21.13 , billed at $42.25 every other month.
DISCLAIMER: You may not use Intelius or the information it provides to make decisions about consumer credit, employment, insurance, tenant screening, or any other purpose that would require FCRA compliance. Intelius does not provide consumer reports and is not a consumer reporting agency. (These terms have special meanings under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, 15 USC 1681 et seq., ("FCRA"), which are incorporated herein by reference.)"
Instant Checkmate - Best Background Check Service for Ease of Use
Advantages
- Value for the money
- Timely and reliable data
- Wonderful search tools
- With a subscription, reports are unlimited
Disadvantages
- No possibility for single reports
A people search engine called Instant Checkmate compiles information from public records and public documents. The program has a simple interface and provides a wealth of information, such as possible contact information and criminal and traffic histories. It can be unpleasant when results take a while to appear, and the service asks you numerous questions and issues caution before delivering a report.
You can use Instant Checkmate to search for someone using only their name, city, and state. It can be challenging to discover it on the Instant Checkmate website. When you conduct a search, you’re given a list of possible matches and have the option to get a comprehensive report for any individual upon the purchase of a membership plan.
There is no information accessible through Instant Checkmate that you cannot obtain elsewhere since the program solely examines public records. The platform does, however, cast a wide net and includes available information about homes, cars, previous addresses, relatives, known aliases, and bankruptcies in its reports.
The search engine can also let you know if the person you're looking for is potentially a registered sex offender, whether they have a weapons license, and whether they have any available arrest, criminal or traffic convictions on their record.
When compared to other search tools, this site offers a huge variety of data, which is one of its main features. It can be annoying to use Instant Checkmate because you have to navigate through more than a dozen pop-up windows in order to purchase a membership plan to view the final report. However, if you can get over this shortcoming, Instant Checkmate is really simple to utilize.
The cost of monthly membership with unlimited person reports is about $35.12 per month.
DISCLAIMER: You may not use Instant Checkmate or the information it provides to make decisions about consumer credit, employment, insurance, tenant screening, or any other purpose that would require FCRA compliance. Instant Checkmate does not provide consumer reports and is not a consumer reporting agency. (These terms have special meanings under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, 15 USC 1681 et seq., ("FCRA"), which are incorporated herein by reference.)"
PeopleFinders - Best Background Check Service for Public Records Source
Advantages
- Reporting that’s inexpensive and thorough
- discovers information that rivals lack
- A user-friendly web page
- Buy individual records
- Great phone applications
Disadvantages
- No data from social media
PeopleFinders is a people-finding service, as implied by the name, and it excels in this regard. It's an easy-to-use web tool for researching people using public records, and it searches public sources using only the name, phone number, email address, or address. One report can be purchased, or you can purchase unlimited access to conduct as many searches as you like.
PeopleFinders provides a number of methods for finding people. You can input a known address, phone number, email address, or the person's name and city. For name searches, PeopleFinders can provide you with a list of possible matches, along with age and known relatives, to help you narrow down your search.
This is crucial since many similar search tools show you a paywall before you know if your search has yielded any results.
PeopleFinders has a variety of price plans. There are two reports for a single person: a search report with basic contact details and a background report with criminal, property, and judicial records. A monthly subscription also grants you access to an unlimited number of reports.
We thought their service was thorough and that it turned up some data that competitors had missed.
Although it lacks social media data and the website cannot be viewed outside of the US, it isn't that great for internet-related things. However, if you need to use it for a longer amount of time, it's one of the most cost-effective solutions, with a background check cost of $24.95 per month after that.
Spokeo - Best Background Check Service for Criminal & Traffic Records Check
Advantages
- Comprehensive online searches
- Periodic updates to reports
- Reverse phone lookups
Disadvantages
- Online name matching may not be reliable
You can access what Spokeo refers to as a wide range of industry-leading sources by searching for a person's name using their email address.
Additionally, as new information is received, regular report revisions are expected. A person's hobbies, education level, financial situation, dating profile information, and even some music and gaming accounts may all be found via Spokeo.
However, not all searches yielded proper results since some names were misspelled, which indicated little human involvement. However, Spokeo gets a bonus point for its capability to conduct a reverse phone number search on annoying spam callers.
US Search - Best Background Check Service for Affordability
Advantages
- Inexpensive reporting
- Excellent search options and membership plans
- Updated information
- Results from searches are quick
- Reports can provide contact details
Disadvantages
- No possibility to purchase a single report
In addition to background checks, US Search lets you go back in time because it has a design that’s reminiscent of Yahoo in 1993. However, it seems that US Search has been able to invest more in comprehensive search options, membership plans, and outstanding price points rather than site design.
By entering the person's name, mobile number, or address into US Search, you can search for them with reliability. There could be a lengthy search results list from US Search.
Unlike other people's search tools, US Search doesn't erect a paywall in front of the search results. You only pay to get the report for a certain person, but you can browse the list to find the proper person.
Basic details, including family members' names, previous homes, properties owned, and any criminal and traffic records, can be included in the reports. They could also include available phone numbers, email addresses, and social media accounts to contact the individual you seek. Because of this, US Search is beneficial for contacting a former friend or a long-lost family. Pricing options of background check cost a monthly membership at $19.86 per month .
DISCLAIMER: You may not use US Search or the information it provides to make decisions about consumer credit, employment, insurance, tenant screening, or any other purpose that would require FCRA compliance. US Search does not provide consumer reports and is not a consumer reporting agency. (These terms have special meanings under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, 15 USC 1681 et seq., ("FCRA"), which are incorporated herein by reference.)"
Ranking Methodology for the Best Background Check Services
Here are the factors we looked at while choosing the best background check services on the market.
Obtaining State Records
With the submission of a form physically or digitally, some states now immediately offer free or inexpensive searches. Given the time-consuming work involved in conducting an online search, it could be far easier to pay for a premium search that also contains relevant state information (and possibly in certain offline sources).
A premium records search could confirm a professional certification (in the state of practice), academic qualifications, possible marriage certificates, death certificates, criminal and traffic offenses, and other sensitive information.
Searches on Social Media
Social media searches are increasingly being incorporated. Other background checks might use specialized software to examine patterns, identities, and biographies, although some free searches are only authorized to use Google to search public names and linked pages.
Reliability of Report Information
Outdated information may make it difficult for you to achieve your needs. Your ability to make an informed choice will be aided by the reliability and expertise of the top background check services.
Customized Search
Casting a wide net is a good thing, but not all background checks are created equal. You may want to focus on specific information, in which case you need a company that can properly target the results to your needs. A great background check service will offer various degrees of background reports to ensure that you can search for the details you require for your circumstance.
Effortless Use
You don't have to be a private investigator and have any special technical knowledge to use background checks. The best background checks ought to be simple to use and present information in a straightforward manner. The top services offer you the quickest turnaround time and the most straightforward manner.
Customer Service
Strong customer support teams that are knowledgeable about the industry will be available to answer any queries you may have about top background checks. They need to be able to explain why your search keeps hitting brick walls if that’s the case.
Additionally, record search providers ought to be centered on providing their clients with the ideal outcomes rather than trying to upsell searches that might not be what you require.
A premium search is a fantastic technique to try and locate the data you require but might not be able to locate on your own. Most for-profit services will compile the available data and present it to you in an organized, simple-to-read style.
Best Background Check Services - Ultimate Guide
Background check services are a simple and valuable tool when someone needs to know about another person before establishing a personal connection. The definition of a background check, its process, and the kinds of information it can discover are all covered in the tutorial that follows.
What Is a Background Check Site?
A background check site methodically searches public websites and public records sources for available information about the person you're looking for. Although you could theoretically obtain the majority of the records the services have access to, it could take you weeks or even months to find the available information you require.
Background check services may search through millions of public documents and provide a thorough report in several minutes. Online background checks may provide information on a person's educational and employment, financial records, and other aspects of their life outside criminal and traffic records.
The Shrewd Searcher’s Guide to Finding Quality Background Checks
Individuals who use private searches for their own security are looking for the same documents and have a lot of the same rights. And even if a Google search turns up a sizable number of reliable background check sites, there are several things you should consider before choosing the service that's best for you.
Best Background Check Services – FAQ
Which Is the Most Detailed Background Check Company?
The most reliable background check website available is called Beenverified. It offers public record information, which can include addresses, phone numbers, property details, civil judgments, possible social media profiles and pictures, as well as available court records and criminal and traffic records.
Why Run a Background Check?
The reason why you should run background checks is to learn about a person's past, present, and future history. Background checks are carried out, for instance, to see if a person has criminal or traffic violations or if they have ever been in any sort of legal difficulty.
Their recruitment history, possible relatives known aliases, and other data might be important. Available Criminal and traffic records can be included in "background checks".
How Long Does a Background Check Take?
The length of a background check might range from a few seconds to a few minutes, depending on the service provider. They often have access to public court records and other public record information.
The turnaround time is determined by how quickly you need the report back and any additional background check costs. While some background check services promise immediate findings, this isn't always attainable for all types of reports.
Are Background Check Services Legal?
In most states, background checks are legal. But there are rules and specifications for carrying out these searches in every state.
As a result, if you have any concerns regarding the background checks rules in your state, you must speak with a lawyer.
Best Background Check Services: The Takeaway
There is a ton of public information online today because of technology. Getting your hands on the correct type of report you need is the most difficult step. Background check sites and apps might make it easier to feel at ease.
By conducting background checks on dates, or other new people in your life, you could potentially avoid risky circumstances entirely. Even better, you could use these services to halt scammers in their tracks.
You can use these services to view your public record background information as well as the backgrounds of others. You never know what kind of info is available. If you have even the smallest concern about a new buddy, date, acquaintance, chatty coworker, family friend, or anyone who is hanging out at your house, why not run background checks right away?
All product names, logos, brands, trademarks, and registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
DISCLAIMER: You may not use the non-FCRA approved services mentioned in this article or the information they provide to decide about consumer credit, employment, insurance, tenant screening, or any other purpose that would require FCRA compliance. These services don’t provide consumer reports and are not consumer reporting agencies. (These terms have special meanings under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, 15 USC 1681 et seq., (“FCRA”), which are incorporated herein by reference.)
The information available on our website may not be 100% accurate, complete, or up to date, so do not use it as a substitute for your own due diligence, especially if you have concerns about a person’s criminal history. The services we mention do not make any representation or warranty about the accuracy of the information available through our website or about the character or integrity of the person about whom you inquire. For more information, please review each service’s Terms of Use.
Ahad Waseem