6 Best Reverse Image Search Engines, Mobile Apps & Websites

There are times when while surfing the internet we come across many images but, there are some images which are new to us and maybe in the category of our favorite things. Like there can be an image of a car which has been newly launched, or any kind of new technology which has been introduced and more such things. In this kind of curious scenarios where the origin of the image is not known, even the monogram on the image is not visible and even sometimes the watermark of websites gets blurred which binds the information.

So here comes the term “ Reverse image search ” which is best suited for scenarios where people who are curious about the information regarding any image can put the image in the search bar and can get immediate results regarding all the information that the image holds for example, on which website the image was put, who is  the owner of the image etc.

One such question arises when we think about reverse image search and that is why is it not so much in use? Because not many people know about it. A maximum number of searches on any search engine is dedicated to textual search but reverse image search have very limited number of cases where it can be used and that is why people are not much aware of it and prefer textual search over it. If you are curious to know more about reverse image search and some knowledge regarding its working process then this article will cover some overall information about reverse image search.

What is Reverse Image search, its uses and how it works?

A reverse image search system is a system which requires image as in input and provides all the information regarding the image like who is the owner, what are the copyrights on it or can also show some relevant images to input image. To put it in technical words a reverse image search engine comprises of  query technique which is context-based image retrieval system (CBIR) which involves providing a CBIR with a sample image and on which the search is based upon.

So a CBIR runs an algorithm where the input image is put onto various operations to get  the desired result. Now this algorithm can be based upon any kind of images feature detection where the local features of the image can be detected, or it can be based upon finding comprehensive images relevant to the input image, or a method where features of the image are described in words so that it’s origin can be found.

For the purpose of information retrieval, the search query is formulated the sample image. Particularly speaking of reverse images search, this search is categorized where the search terms are lacking.

Uses of reverse image search:

  • You can search for a similar image by providing images.
  • You can get the detailed information that the image holds.
  • The search results can be completely precise sometimes.
  • You can track down if an image is protected by a copyright and where it is used illegally.
  • If you are an information graphic creator then it is the best method.

Top Reverse Image Search Engines

1.Google Images

The number one giant search engines which have been top for years now established images search services in 2001. Google images have been used widely all around the world. Since it holds the biggest database of the world compared to other search engine’s databases it was originated 15 years ago from now and is still preferred more over any other search engines. With good search results and accuracy, Google has always been great rewarding its viewers with superb results. It is capable of providing thousands of relevant images in no time.

google-reverse-image-search

How does it work?

To carry on a search you can drop the link of an image or upload the image itself else drag and drop the image in the image bar.

  • With the maximum number of image indexed in the google database, you can get exact results in seconds.
  • It has no limit of file size that needs to be uploaded or dropped.
  • It is completely free to use you just need an image which can be saved from anywhere on the web.

If you want to use google image search on a mobile site then this service is not yet provided to mobile users but we have some great apps where you can perform an image search.

2. Bing – Image Match

Microsoft introduced its own search engine in 2014 which also came with reverse image search tool known as “ Bing Image Match”. In this image search tool, you can add an image directly or add the link of the image almost every reverse image search have same operations. This one is simple too but the search cannot be carried out as efficient as on Google image search. Since it is owned by one of the leading tech companies you can expect some good results from this one too. So the procedure here is a bit different from the earlier one.

bing-reverse-image-search

Once you reach the bing you need to click on images for image search and then either you can upload the image from where you have stored in PC and also you can insert the hyperlink for the image. After doing so the bing image search will be carried out in the database where the images are indexed and results will be shown. The results might not be as satisfied as google image search but it is still better to prefer in cases you don’t get any result from google images.

3.Tiny Eye

A Toronto based company named IDEE.inc owns Tiny Eye. It is impressive to know that in the competition of such great search engines like bing and google it has over 15.6 billions of images indexed which creates a very high probability to provide a better search result from Bing. With such great database, it is considered as the best tool for reverse image search and stands after Google image search.

tiny-eye-reverse-image-search

It is one of the best-renowned tools in the field of a reverse image search and is completely dedicated to finding similar images mostly.

To make a reverse image search on the Tiny eye you need to upload an image or insert its hyperlink. Once entered you can get results just in a fraction of seconds. The results of image search on tiny eye include website name, imaged preview, the name of the image and websites that are using similar images.

Since this tool is completely dedicated to reverse image search it has some good results for image based queries. You can even add a plugin to your browsers like google chrome, UC browser or Mozilla Firefox browser to add this reverse image tool as a shortcut. It is capable of supporting image type of jpeg, png, and Gif types image file. The size of the image that you need to upload is limited to 20MB which creates a certain limit to the process of reverse image search.

As an input image, it doesn’t take image features to find the similar images but it reads an image as whole to provide relevant results for an image. If you want to track any image that has your copyright and is being used or stolen by someone else then this tool suits best for this kind of requirement.But this tool is not available for free use like google image search.

For weekly usage, you can search up to 150 images a week but of you need to exceed the limit of reverse image search then you have to pay an amount of $200 for the annual package. To know if your image has been uploaded on any website you can use tiny eye alerts which notify you whenever someone uploads your images in which you own a copyright. Overall, it is claimed to be on top of the list for best reverse image search engines but with the limited database, it cannot gain the first position in this category.

4.Yandex

Yandex Images is one of the best-known search engine of Russia. In other words, you can say that Yandex is Google for Russia. Yandex has its own image and reverses image tool which looks somewhat exactly like Google but no matter what it looks it is the service which matters. After Goggle released its reverse image search engine Yandex followed and developed on of its own too since it is well known in Russia.

In Yandex reverse image search engine you can follow the same procedure as we did in google reverse image search. You can upload an image and also add the image hyperlink in the search bar. You can select the type and size of input image like if an image is small, mediums or large in size which helps Yandex to look for the particular size of an image.

yandex-reverse-image-search

If you want to track down any image that has your copyright and is being used by someone else this is the best tool for the variety of database is quite different the search results that are provided in the end are efficient search results. So you don’t need to sign up or do anything else but you can perform as many reverse image search and it is totally free and simple to use. But can only be used in Russia.

5. Berify

Berify is a reverse image search engine. You get all of the best search engines in one place to always get the very best results. Find stolen images online and get credit for your work.
1- Upload photos, 2- Scan images or import your photos using multiple platforms, 3- Get notified when stolen photos are found online without your consent. We don’t use a standard Google image search to return matches. You can also use Berify to find where an image came from, locate specific sites where the image appears, find bigger or higher resolution images of a picture or even identify the owner of an image so you can ask to use it.

6. Image Raider

Image raider image search engine is yet another reverse image search engine which may not be as big as other image search engines like google, bing, etc but due to some of its extra feature, it is known to be providing good end results. Unlike another image search engines where you need to provide only one image as an input image raider, reverse image search engine provides multi-image search platform as you can provide more than one image as input.

In other search engines where you need to upload an image or add the hyperlink of the image for the search, Image Raider provides many different methods to provide an image as an output.

  • You can add an image from XML sitemap.
  • If you add the URL of the image then image raider search tool will directly fetch the image may it be multiple images.
  • You can also add an image from your DevianArt, 500px or Flicker account.

image-raider-reverse-image-search

Image Raider is known for continuous service updates which directly allows its clients to upload their image catalogs and notifies its clients whenever their image appears or is used by any website. The image raider search engines perform parsing on google , bing, and Yandex search engines so if any of its client images is used by any website on the search engines then it sends a ping message to its client.

The best feature of this reverse image search Engine is that you can perform an image search of up to 20 images together which is the high level of multiple image search. Initially, when you sign up on image raider you get free 300 credits these credits are used to perform reverse image search. Every time you provide an image or hyperlink of image for input one credit gets deducted which limits your image search process. Since if you have one sign up then you can search for upto 300 images.

Reverse Image Search Apps For Smartphones (Android & iOS)

After the launch of smartphones, most of the internet surfing clients are smartphone users. Ther are time when these smartphone users come across an image for which they need to perform a reverse image search but since google and many other search engines do not provide the service to perform reverse image search on smartphones users there are some great apps developed by google developers and iOS developers for android and iOS users to simply and easily perform reverse image searches.

1.Veracity (iOS)

If you want to find the real truth behind the image pixels then Veracity is an app introduced by iOS developers. Which means it is only applicable for iOS devices. There are not many apps or other kinds of options on iOS where you can do reverse image search so this app is a great tool which gives satisfactory results in seconds. Using this app you can find any information regarding an image like where the image belongs, who is illegally using it and much more. You can use this app for completely free but it comes with some advertisements so if you want to get rid of advertisements then you need to pay $1.99.

2.Google Goggles (Android)

The name itself says a lot about this app. Since it is particularly developed for android users it functions exactly like google reverse image search. Since this app is completely dedicated to reverse image search it provides better results since it needs to search the indexed images from the google database. The reverse image search procedure is same here too just upload an image or provide its hyperlink or URL to get instant results.

Conclusion

So we have covered all the best reverse image search engines and also some great reverse image search apps for iOS and android as well. There are many options to select a perfect reverse image search engine some are free and simple while other reverse image search engine can have some limitations over search and the size of the image. You can read through and decide on your own which suits your requirements. Even there are some reverse image search engines for which you need to pay over a number of limited searches.

Komal have been always passionate about technical stuff specially related to computer science and blogging is a great way of gaining knowedge as well as making it awailable for everyone else. Being CEO of Technofizi komal aim to give genuine and peirced knowledge for all the knowledge seekers and also her Team Technofizi have been sorting out some of practical technical problems to give our viewers a great and effecient solution to their problems.

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