Phone Number Lookup
Any phone number read against the numbering plans: the country it belongs to, what its range is for, whether it can exist at all, and every form it is written and dialled in.
Overview
A phone number is built to a plan. Its country calling code, the digits after the plus, names a country or a
group of countries sharing one, as +1 does for the United States, Canada and much of the Caribbean.
The country's own numbering plan then gives each range a purpose, mobile, landline, toll-free and so on, and a
length. The lookup checks a number against those plans and writes it out in every standard form, which is what
is needed to enter it into a phone system correctly or to tell a mistyped number from a real one.
Web interface
- Type or paste a number; the result appears as you type. A complaint about the input waits until you stop typing. The buttons under the field fill in an example.
- Country, beside the number, is the country of the number. It lists every country the
plans know, 245 of them, with flag and calling code, and its search finds a country by name or by calling
code, as
+49. Choose it for a number written without a country code; a number written with one shows its own country there. It starts at the country your browser's language names, or Germany when it names none, and the result shows how a foreign number is dialled from that country. - The result shows the number in large type, chips for its validity, country and line type, a sentence on what that means, and the number in each form; for a mobile number also the network its range was assigned to. A click on a value selects all of it.
URL parameters
| Pattern | Example |
|---|---|
| /lookup/phone/{E.164} | /lookup/phone/+4921159893990 |
The address bar follows the input and always holds the number in E.164, the plus and the digits, which needs no country to be read. An extension is not part of the link.
Input rules
- With a country code:
+49 211 59893990or0049 211 59893990. - Without one, read as a number from the chosen Country:
0211 59893990with Germany,(202) 555-0123with the United States. - Spaces, dashes, brackets and dots are ignored. An extension may follow, as
ext. 12.
| Message | When |
|---|---|
That is too short to be a phone number. | fewer digits than any number in the country has |
That is too long to be a phone number. | more digits than any number in the country has |
No country has the calling code +999. | a calling code no country uses |
That is not a phone number. It needs digits, and may start with + and a country code. | no digits to speak of |
Reading the result
For +49 211 59893990, looked up in a browser set to the United States:
| Row | Value |
|---|---|
| Country | Germany, +49; for a number the plans cannot place, only its calling code |
| Line type | Landline; what the range is for, left out when the number is not valid |
| Range assigned to | the network the range of a mobile number was assigned to, see below; left out for this landline, and wherever the data lists none |
| International | +49 211 59893990, grouped as the country writes it |
| National | 0211 59893990, as dialled within the country |
| E.164 | +4921159893990, the international standard form, as phone systems store numbers |
| Link | tel:+4921159893990, the form a web page links a number with (RFC 3966) |
| Dialled from the United States | 011 49 211 59893990, with the exit code of the country your browser names; only for a number from another country |
| Extension | when the input carries one |
Valid means the country's numbering plan gives out numbers of this form. Not in the
numbering plan means it does not: +49 30 12 starts with Berlin's area code, but is no number
the plan gives out.
Some countries keep mobile and landline numbers in the same ranges, the United States among them; there the
line type reads Landline or mobile.
Range assigned to names the network a range of mobile numbers was given to, for 206 country
calling codes: +49 1579 1234567 is in a range
listed as Eplus/Sipgate. It names the network of the range, not of the number. In many countries,
Germany among them, a number can move to another network and keep its digits; where the data marks a country
so, the result adds that the number may be with another network today. The names are those the ranges were
assigned under, some from before a merger, as Eplus, part of Telefónica Germany since 2014. For landlines there is no such data.
What it cannot tell
- Whether a number is connected, who holds it, or which network serves it today. The plans describe ranges, not the network. Only a query to the mobile network itself, an HLR lookup, tells the current one.
- A number moved to another provider keeps the type and the network of its range here, so a ported mobile number is still a mobile number, listed under the network it came from.
- The numbering plans are brought up to date regularly, but a range a country has only just opened may not be known yet.
- To see the number your own phone sends when it calls, use the Caller ID Check.
No API
There is no API for this tool. The lookup runs entirely in the browser.
Privacy
No number leaves the browser. The numbering plans are fetched from this site with the page, and every lookup
runs on them locally. For a mobile number the page also fetches the list of networks for its country calling code,
once, from this site: that request names the calling code, as 49, never the number. The address
bar changes as you type, which puts the number into the browser's history like any other page.