About Searchadex

The public records lookup professionals actually use.

What Searchadex Is

Searchadex is a free directory of official government portals for public records research across all 50 states. We don't store records, don't resell data, and don't charge for access. Every link goes straight to the authoritative source — Secretary of State databases for business entities and UCC liens, professional licensing boards, court records, notary commissions, and federal databases. If a free official portal exists, we want it indexed here.

Built by a practitioner

Searchadex was built by a commercial lender with 15 years of experience in SBA and C&I lending. Running UCC searches, verifying business entity status, and checking professional licenses wasn't occasional — it was part of every deal review. The frustration of hunting down the right state portal, every time, for every transaction, is what led to building this. Searchadex is the resource that should have existed already.

Who We Are

Searchadex is built and maintained by an editorial team with hands-on experience in commercial banking, underwriting, compliance, and due diligence. We're the people who actually use these portals for work — verifying borrowers before closing, running UCC searches before extending secured credit, and confirming entity status before signing contracts. That's why the directory is organized the way it is: not by alphabetical state, but by the kinds of questions professionals actually ask.

Why We Built It

The public records aggregator industry is broken. Most directories are either: (1) bloated SEO farms designed to push paid background check upsells, (2) outdated link lists from 2010 that haven't been touched in a decade, or (3) bait-and-switch sites that promise "free" lookups and gate the actual data behind a credit card. Meanwhile, the official government portals — which are free, authoritative, and legally definitive — are scattered across 50 state websites with no centralized index. Searchadex fixes that. Every link is to an official source. Every portal is verified. Every search is free.

Editorial Standards

Our editorial process follows four rules:

  • Official sources only. We never link to third-party aggregators or paid services as a primary record source.
  • Hand-verified portals. Every link is manually tested before publication and re-verified on a rolling basis.
  • Transparent limitations. Where a state portal has known issues (slow performance, exact-name matching requirements, missing record types), we note it on the state page.
  • Reader corrections welcomed. Government URLs change without notice. If you find a broken or moved link, our contact form sends a direct alert and we update within 48 hours.

What Searchadex Is Not

Searchadex is not a background check service, a consumer reporting agency, or an FCRA-compliant data provider. We do not provide criminal record searches, employment screening, tenant screening, or any service governed by the Fair Credit Reporting Act. For those use cases, please use a licensed FCRA-compliant provider. Searchadex covers public business records, professional licenses, notary commissions, and federal databases — information that is, by law, freely searchable by anyone.

Contact and Corrections

Found a broken link, outdated portal, or missing state resource? Send corrections through our contact form. We respond to verified corrections within 48 hours.