Trace Cell Phones

There are two ways that you can trace a cell phone call: you can either use publicly available information to trace the issuing location of a phone number. Or, you can use a reverse phone lookup to access special databases that will give you the IDENTITY of the owner of the phone number.

Below you'll learn how to trace a cell phone number's issuing location for free... but if you're interested in tracing the name, address, and background information about the owner, click here to run a search using comprehensive Reverse Phone Detective databases.

If you want to trace cell phone numbers, you first need to look carefully at the anatomy of the number itself. To keep up with the need for new telephone numbers, the North American Numbering Plan (NANP) was developed as a joint effort between AT&T and Bell.

The Anatomy of a Phone Number

According to the NANP, phone numbers are divided into three sections. The first three numbers are known as the area code. The second three are known as the central office code while the remaining four are the line number. While the line number itself won't provide you with much useful information if you're trying to trace cell phone calls, the other two sets of digits can be very helpful.

The area code can start with any digit between 2 to 9, but the other two digits can be made up of any numbers between 0 and 9. Area codes are assigned to specific geographic areas. For example, the state of Indiana is divided into six area code sections; and all of the telephone numbers for the area around Indianapolis begin with a 317 area code, while the entire southern part of the state's numbers begin with 812. The same concept is applied for all states.

Trace Cell Phone Numbers

When you want to trace cell phone numbers, you can use the area code to narrow the number down to a certain area. In most cases, the area code covers a few hundred exchanges. These exchanges, like area codes, begin with a number between 2 to 9 and are followed by numbers that can be any digit between 0 and 9. If you know which exchange represents which parts of that zip code area, then you can close in on the location of the number in question.

If you want to trace cell phone numbers on your own, you can do so in a very limited way simply by finding out which part of the country is represented by the specific area code. However, that will only help you find a still relatively large area.

Knowing the section of that area covered by the exchange associated with the number you’re investigating might help you narrow your search down to a particular city or county, but will still not give you enough information to zero in on your target.

Who Owns That Cell Phone?

To trace cell phone numbers, you need to access a reverse phone directory that includes cell phone listings. Unfortunately, most of the popular directories do not contain these numbers and will, therefore, be useless to you as you try to trace cell phone calls.