An independent business name search service, not a government website. How our checks work

We run preliminary name checks against state business records to help you see whether a name appears to be taken before you file. Only the official Secretary of State database is authoritative, and we link to it on every result so you can verify for yourself. Some links on this site are affiliate links; see our disclosure.

Read more: How the check works

BusinessNameSearch Pre-filing name check
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Privacy Policy

Last updated: July 10, 2026

BusinessNameSearch.us is operated by Startupsole LLC. We are an independent information service, not a law firm and not affiliated with any state or federal government agency. This page explains what happens to the information that passes through the site.

The names you search

When you run a name check, the state you selected and the business name you typed are sent to our server and forwarded to a third-party availability provider to query state records. We do not build profiles of your searches, and we strip search terms from the page URLs reported to analytics. Searched names are processed to answer your query and for short-lived operational logging, not stored as a marketing dataset.

Analytics

We use Google Analytics 4 to understand aggregate usage: which pages are visited and whether the checker succeeds or fails. Analytics events record the state being searched and the outcome type (available, taken, unverified); they do not include the business name you entered. You can block analytics with standard browser tools and the site works unchanged.

Affiliate disclosure

Some links on this site are affiliate links, marked as sponsored where they appear. If you follow one (for example, "Start your LLC with this name") and purchase a formation service, Startupsole LLC may earn a commission at no additional cost to you. Affiliate links pass through our own /go/ redirect, which attaches an anonymous tracking reference so the partner can attribute the sale. Affiliate relationships never change a search result: the official state database link stays primary on every result we show, whether or not an affiliate link appears beside it.

Advertising click identifiers

If you arrive from a Google Ads campaign, Google appends a click identifier (such as gclid) to the landing URL. We keep that identifier in your browser's session storage for the duration of your visit and forward it only when you use an affiliate link, so the referral can be attributed to the ad. It is discarded when your session ends.

Cookies and storage

The site itself sets no tracking cookies. Google Analytics, when active, sets its own cookies under Google's policies. Session storage is used only for the advertising click identifier described above.

Hosting and request logs

The site is served by Cloudflare. Like any web host, Cloudflare processes your IP address and request details to deliver pages and to protect against attacks and abuse. That processing is Cloudflare's, under Cloudflare's own privacy terms.

Three kinds of request reach this site's own code instead of a stored page: the name check and the affiliate redirect described above, and any address that matches no page. Cloudflare writes a record of those requests into our account, keeps it for up to 7 days, then deletes it. The record holds the address requested, the browser's user agent string, the network the request came from, the IP address, and any cookie the browser sends with it. It does not hold the business name you typed, which travels in the body of the request and is not recorded. We read it for one purpose: to tell automated crawlers apart from readers on the affiliate links, because the affiliate network reports a click without any of that detail. It is not tied to a name, not used to build a profile, and not shared. Ordinary page views are served from Cloudflare's storage without reaching that code, and leave no such record.

Third-party services

Your choices

You can use every feature of this site without creating an account. Blocking analytics or declining to use affiliate links does not reduce functionality. For questions about this policy or data handling, contact Startupsole LLC through the address published in our partner network profiles.