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Looking to connect with a friend or to expand your network on Snapchat? There are different ways to search for someone’s Snapchat. If you don’t know the exact username, a phone number could get you started easily. In this post, we’ll provide detailed instructions on how to search Snapchat by phone number and helpful tips to connect with others on Snapchat seamlessly.
Can you search Snapchat by phone number?
YES! Snapchat supports searching others by their display name, username, phone number, or Snapcode. Searching by username or phone number is effective as this information is unique for each account[1].
If you have the phone number, upload phone contacts to Snapchat and you may see whether your friends are on the app. Alternatively, you can use a people search engine to discover someone’s potential Snapchat usernames or do the diggings manually.
How to search Snapchat by phone number
1. Sync your phone contact to Snapchat
Snapchat’s Contact Sync is the easiest and fastest way to find someone on Snapchat by phone number. When enabled, Snapchat can access the contact information saved on your device, identify which of your contacts have an account on Snapchat, and let you add them easily.
1) Save the phone number to the contact on your phone (if you haven’t).
2) Open the Snapchat app on your phone.
3) Tap your profile icon in the upper left corner.
4) Scroll down and tap Add Friends.
5) Tap All Contacts.
If you haven’t given Snapchat permission to access your contacts, a prompt will pop up. Follow the on-screen instructions to open your device settings and toggle on Contacts.
6) You’ll find those of your contacts who are on Snapchat. Add the person you’re looking for or invite those who aren’t by sending a text message.
If the synced contact list doesn’t show up properly, simply relaunch the app and try again. Uploading your contact will share details such as the contact’s name, phone number, the time last updated, as well as their email address, photo, related saved date (e.g. a birthday or anniversary), and social media profiles with the Snapchat server[2].
If you’re not comfortable giving out your contact, check out the next method. Or you can try looking up the person’s full name or first name, which people usually set as their Snapchat display name. However, Snapchat will only return a dozen top results (not all) matched with your search query, and you’ll need to sift through similar profiles if the name is generic.
Why can’t I find someone on Snapchat?
If you uploaded the contact but can’t find the desired Snapchat user, here are some possible reasons.
- The person is not on the platform or has registered using an email address without including a phone number. You could log in with the phone number on Snapchat to confirm. If no account is associated with the phone number, you’ll find a message saying We cannot find an account for this phone number.
- The person has linked another phone number or the phone number you searched is old. You can search by the name + phone number on Google or use a people search engine to check if the person owns multiple phone numbers.
- The user has restricted being searched through phone numbers.
- The user has blocked you so you cannot find them.
The contact sync feature is a convenient way to connect with your friends but it’s not foolproof. If it yields no results, follow the guide below to expand your search.
2. Use a people search engine
A people search tool is a simple and effective way to search for someone’s social media profiles. By aggregating a vast array of public data, they offer diverse information on an individual given basic details such as a name, phone number, or email address. It may reveal the person’s contact information, location history, associated social media profiles, and more, when available.
While most people search sites function similarly, the information they provide can vary slightly. To find the best tool for searching Snapchat, we’ve reviewed several products, and TruthFinder tops our list for its wide coverage of social media data and successfully pulled the Snapchat profiles we searched for.
Here’s how to use it:
1) Go to the TruthFinder® website. You can choose a people search by name or a reverse phone number lookup.
2) Fill in the required field and wait a couple of minutes for the search to complete. You need to subscribe to a membership plan to view the full results.
Searching by a phone number may provide possible owners and relevant information such as their phone numbers, email addresses, location history, and associated social media profiles. There might be multiple owners listed, as the data matching of people search sites may associate a phone number with not only its owner but also other relevant individuals, such as their relatives or family members. Be sure to browse through each result to find the person you wish to lookup.
If the report doesn’t contain much social media information, you can click View Background Report for more extended data. This is not included in the phone number report and requires additional subscription costs.
You may find online profiles such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest, Snapchat, and more. If it doesn’t offer a possible Snapchat profile, you can view the content of available profiles like FB, IG, or Twitter. People may share their Snapcode or Snapchat usernames on these platforms.
Additionally, you could initiate further searches on each potential username the person used to discover more social media profiles – that led us to locate the matching Snapchat account.
Other details in the report can include contact, location, public records like business affiliations, employment history, criminal & traffic records, and so on. This info can be helpful if you want to gain an in-depth understanding of the person.
People search tools like TruthFinder create a powerful and time-saving way of finding people and information, but these services typically come at a cost, especially if you want to unlock premium data like social media profiles or background records. If you don’t feel like paying, below is a more hands-on approach.
3. Search for Snapchat usernames manually
If you enjoy a bit of detective work, it’s possible to search for a Snapchat username manually. By leveraging snippets of information about the person and cross-referencing other social media, you might uncover the right Snapchat account. Persistence and creativity are key to this process.
Begin by brainstorming the possible Snapchat usernames the person might use, combining their name, nicknames, known usernames, or variations thereof. For example, if the person is John Doe, potential usernames could be:
- First name + last name e.g. JohnDoe or DoeJohn
- First initial + last name e.g. JDoe or DoeJ
- Variations with random numbers or birth year (e.g. johndoe123; johndoe1976)
- Variations adding special characters (e.g. john_doe; john.doe)
If you have the person’s email address, extract the email prefix (the part before @) – some people use the same handle for social media as they do for email. Try searching these possible usernames on Snapchat to check for matches.
The person’s existing usernames on other social networks can also be valuable clues to trace Snapchat, as many people would use the same or similar usernames across different platforms. If you don’t have any usernames to start with, search for the person’s name on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter, where people are more likely to stay identifiable with real names. On Facebook and LinkedIn, you can filter results by specifying location, company, or education.
Besides, you can upload your contact list to Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to discover associated accounts. It’s similar to syncing your contacts to Snapchat, but the results will depend on how the users manage privacy settings.
Take Instagram for example. To enable contact sync, tap 
Do you have any searching tips or experiences? Feel free to share in the comments.
Once you locate the person, look through the profiles and posts for any mentions or links to their Snapchat profiles. You can also extract the usernames and search them on Snapchat for further verification.
Generally, this process can be somewhat trial and error. Not every search yielded results. You’ll have to expand your searches on every new detail and explore different possibilities until you find what you want.
Conclusion
If you have someone’s phone number, you can save it on your device’s contact list and upload it to Snapchat. This is the most straightforward method and often helps you find the users, except when they avoid being searched through a phone number or don’t link a phone number to their account. In such cases, you can dig out the Snapchat username manually or by taking advantage of a dedicated people search engine. If all else fails, consider reaching out to the person directly and asking for their Snapchat.
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- Public Profile For Business FAQs. (2024, October 2). Snapchat. Retrieved October 2, 2024, from https://businesshelp.snapchat.com/s/article/public-profiles-faq?language=en_US↩
- How to Add Friends on Snapchat. (2014 October 19). Snapchat. Retrieved July 3, 2024, from https://help.snapchat.com/hc/en-us/articles/7012328615828-How-to-Add-Friends-on-Snapchat↩
There’s no guarantee you’ll find the information you’re looking for with the tools discussed in this article. They all source their information from publicly available data sources, such as county, state and federal courts, government departments, and police records, and those sources may contain incorrect or incomplete data. It’s illegal to use these tools to make decisions about employment, admission, consumer credit, insurance, tenant screening, or any other purpose that would require FCRA compliance. Read the Fair Credit Reporting Act to learn more....
