How to Reverse Image Search on iPhone (Feb 2023)

Google's reverse image search can help you find image sources and licenses.

By Leanne Hays Updated 02/01/2023

What to Know

You can do a reverse image search on your iPhone using both the Google Chrome and Safari browsers.
Performing a reverse image search allows you to find the original source, learn the copyright status, track copyright violations, and properly cite your sources.

If you're a content creator, keeping costs down and protecting yourself from copyright lawsuits is of utmost importance. One of the most important ways of doing so is learning how to reverse image search. You can use your iPhone to check where an image came from, or what the licensing agreement is. Read on to learn three methods to reverse image search.

How to Reverse Image Search on iPhone Using Google Chrome

Although Safari is the default browser on iPhones, many users enjoy using Chrome to do their web browsing. If Chrome is your preferred app, here’s how to do a reverse image search with it:

Tap and select the image or the URL of the image you’re investigating and copy it.
Open the Google Chrome app.
Tap Images in the top center of your screen.
In the lower right corner, tap on the ellipses to reach the More menu.
Scroll and tap Request Desktop Site.
On the next screen, tap the camera icon in the search bar (you may need to zoom in by pinching out from the center of your screen to see it clearly).
Here you have a choice to either paste the image URL or upload an image. For this article, we are pasting a URL. Please note that uploading an image is exactly the same process except that you choose an image from your own photos.
Paste the URL.
Tap Search by image.
You’ll now see a page that displays your image and similar images on the web.
Next to your photo at the top, you’ll see links to other sizes of the image in question.
Tap All sizes to see every website that uses that image.

How to Reverse Image Search Using Safari

You can do a reverse image search with Safari in much the same way as in Chrome. Here’s how to get to the Google reverse image search using Safari:

Either copy the image or the URL of the image you’re investigating.
Open the Safari app.
Go to https://www.google.com.
Tap on the word IMAGES at the top of the page.
At the top left, next to the URL, tap on the Aa.
Tap Request Desktop Website.
On the next screen, tap the camera icon in the search bar.
Here you have a choice to either paste the image URL or upload an image. For this article, we are pasting a URL. Please note that uploading an image is exactly the same process, except that you choose an image from your own photos.
Paste the URL and tap Search by image.
You’ll now see a page that displays your image and similar images on the web.
Next to your image at the top, you’ll see links to other sizes of the image in question. Tap All sizes to see every website that uses that image.

How to Perform a Google Images Advanced Search

At some point, you may wish to ask permission for the use of an image you find on the web or find out the full license agreement for an image. You also may want to find a free stock image for your blog. Here is how to do an advanced search and get that vital information. You can discover this info with either the Safari or Chrome app. For this article, we are going to use Safari, but the process is the same in either app.

Open the Safari app.
Go to https://www.google.com.
Tap on the word Images at the top of the page.
At the bottom of your screen, you’ll see the word Settings. Tap that.
Select Advanced Search.
On the next screen, you’ll see nearly every option you can think of; and if you scroll down, you’ll see a menu for usage rights.
Tap on usage rights, and you can choose which types of images you'd like to see.

There you have it. Now you know how to search by image, how to reverse image search, and how to perform a Google images advanced search. Now you can spiff up your social media presence or blog knowing that you have done your due diligence and are using these images legally.

If you enjoyed this tutorial, you might also want to learn how to delete frequently visited sites on the iPhone Safari app.

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Author Details

Leanne Hays

Leanne Hays is a Feature Writer at iPhone Life, and has written hundreds of in-depth how-to and troubleshooting articles. She's a former Associate Editor for iPhone Life magazine, and has written for the Iowa Source, as well as web content for education marketing. Leanne has an associate's degree in education, with a focus on curriculum development, as well as a bachelor's degree in science. She has over nine years of experience with SEO, social media management, and web development and writing. Despite years of web work, Leanne is by no means an early adapter; she's only owned a smartphone for five years, which makes her highly sympathetic to the learning curve of new iPhone owners. She enjoys making reader's lives easier and putting her education experience to work by walking them through the most practical ways to use Apple devices, step-by-step.

In off-work hours, Leanne is a mother of two, homesteader, audiobook fanatic, musician, and learning enthusiast.