How do I find out whether someone is still living or has died?

[AFrustratingSituation]

What is the quickest, cheapest, easiest and most straightforward way of checking whether someone is still living or has died?

Thank you.

https://www.deceasedonline.com

try this?

It was a risk that paid off then! 😆

It's a complicated situation.

I just really wanted to know how to go about it if the obvious channels weren't an option.

Go to Oda Mae Brown and see if she can channel their spirit?

If you think they are dead you can check with the registrar where they lived. Unfortunately there isn’t a national death certificate database.

Unfortunately there isn’t a national death certificate database.

There is one for each of the countries in the UK - Eng & Wales, NI and Scotland.

I've been searching for someone too and it seems pretty impossible. People dont have to register the right name or date of birth even in death records. I asked the same question here a while back and the only answer is private investigator. I don't have the money for one but I'm still somehow trying to find my person. Good luck OP!

Eh,

Signing off a death certificate with false information
is a criminal offence
(because it could be covering up murder)

We tried to track down my brother who'd not seen for 30 years, hired a private detective. He found him quite quickly. And yeah, was alive. An option if you don't get any info with the suggestions on here.

Ancestry does also have much more recent info which it pulls from the main UK funeral notices site:

funeral-notices.co.uk/

Could they have died abroad? My late dad did tracing research often for inheritance issues. I remember him saying it was difficult ( but not impossible) if people had moved abroad. He tracked an elderly Irishman to America for a farm inheritance job. Sorry I’m not being much help- can’t ask him how he did it 😔

I assume from what you have put that you are in the UK. Always ponder whether someone has died elsewhere as they are then missed, unless there is something will-related in the UK too.

Two of your friends are probate records and the electoral roll. With probate it depends when and which bit of the UK.

Search probate records for documents and wills (England and Wales) - GOV.UK

Electoral roll? Voters can tick to not be included in what is called the Open Register. If they are in the Open Register the 2026 roll is on 192.com (and elsewhere).

Electoral Roll - Electoral Register - 192.com

So coming up on the electoral roll is a good indicator of probable life.

192 is good for lots of things too, but you will need to pay something for searches. You can often build a trail of where someone might have been in recent years.

Other possible things to try:

If they have been a company director you can look them up by name on Companies House.

If they have been a trustee of a charity that is regulated by the Charity Commission, you can look them up by name on the Charity Commission website.

You may be able to find their date of birth via an ancestry search on their full name and place of birth. Once you have a date of birth - even if it's roughly within five years - it's easier then to search for them online, including for a possible death.

Ancestry does also pull more recent death information from funeral-notices.co.uk, or you can consult the latter directly. I think it has information currently up to 2022.

May I ask you how much this cost please? I’m trying to track down my DD’s father who is proving completely untraceable and I’m pretty skilled at researching. Tried every method suggested here, many many millions of times.

Am sorry, my brother sorted it out so don't know the exact cost. We had to find the missing brother for his share of late fathers estate. I don't think it was more than £2-300 though, and they found him in less than two weeks. This was 5 years ago.

Missing brother wasn't working and wasn't registered to vote or with a GP, so it was hard on my own trying to find. I tried the local housing dept too, to pass on a message and they lied and said he wasn't on their books. Hit a dead end, that's why did a PI.

Good luck. I don't think all PI's use legal methods tbh....!

Stupid as it sounds, I've considered a PI more than once.

The person would be in their late 70s now.

I'm sorry you're having a similar difficulty.

When did you last know this person was alive? https://www.freebmd.org.uk/ has death records up to 1997.
The General Register Office (GRO) publishes records up to 6 months before the day you're searching https://www.gov.uk/research-family-history

Try a library near you, librarians can be very good, usually they have free access to Ancestry. The GRO website lists some larger libraries that hold microfiche copies of GRO index numbers, which you'd need if you want to request the actual death certificate.

This is why the UK needs an equivalent of rip.ie

On the off chance they are of Irish heritage you could try RIP.ie. The vast majority of Irish families post death notices and funeral arrangements there, and this often includes 1st/2nd generation living abroad at the time of death. Eg ‘the death has occurred of XXX of Manchester, formerly of Killarney’

100% this!!!!

If they have a middle name/names then searching for their birth may help you narrow down their age, which may then help you trace a death.

searching 192.com to try and get an idea of their most recent location (if they are listed) is helpful as well.

a lot also depends on the name. Finding a John James Smith is much much harder than a Trixibelle Nightingale Davies Smith.

Give them a sharp prod

If you come at something like this from different angles you can usually find someone. Various posters have made suggestions. Work through them all and you will turn things up. It can be good to bounce ideas off others who know what is going on (not suggesting you do that here as you clearly want to keep this confidential). Sometimes you don't spot a lead. Tracking known associates and relatives can turn things up.

A friend does finding people as part of her work. She has had more recent successes using facial recognition (for instance PimEyes) that has surprised me.

looking for children or grandchildren on social media can be very good.

I tracked down when my ex (father of my two daughters) arrived back in the UK thanks to some very slack privacy settings of a relative of his who uploaded hundreds of pics from a family party.

Just about all deaths are registered in the UK as you can't bury or cremate someone until that is done. Also if you want to get their finances sorted, you need the death certificate.
So hopefully you will find out the information you need soon enough.