To find a booking number, search the online jail roster for the county where the arrest happened using the person’s full legal name and date of birth. The roster will return the booking number along with the charges, bond amount, and housing location. If the arrest is federal, use the Federal Bureau of Prisons inmate locator instead. If the online search returns nothing or the jail has no public roster, call the facility directly.
A booking number is assigned during intake at the jail and acts as the tracking code for that specific arrest. It’s what a bail bond company, a defense attorney, or a family member depositing commissary funds will ask for. Because each jail issues its own numbers, there’s no national database to search. The right tool depends on where the person is being held.
Details to Gather Before You Search
A few pieces of information make the difference between a clean result and a frustrating dead end. The most important is the person’s full legal name as it appears on a government ID. Nicknames and shortened names don’t match booking records. A middle name matters when the last name is common.
Beyond the name, have these ready:
- Date of birth. Most search tools use it as the primary filter after the name, and for common names it’s effectively required.
- Approximate arrest date. Many rosters let you filter by booking date, which helps when the person has a prior arrest in the same county.
- City and county of arrest. Booking numbers come from the facility that processed the arrest, so searching the wrong county returns nothing.
- Physical descriptors. Some systems accept filters for age range, race, or sex when you don’t have a birth date.
You can still search with only a name, but expect to scroll through matches.
Searching a County or City Jail Roster
Most counties publish a public inmate lookup on the sheriff’s office or jail website. The tool is usually labeled “inmate search,” “jail roster,” or “who’s in custody.” Enter the name and date of birth and the record comes back with the booking number, charges, bond, and current location.
City police departments generally book arrestees into the county jail, so the county sheriff’s site is usually the right starting point even for a city arrest. In larger metro areas with multiple facilities, one county search tool typically covers all of them.
Timing catches people off guard. A booking number doesn’t appear online the moment someone is arrested. Intake itself takes time, and the record then has to be entered into the database. Depending on the facility and how busy it is, a new booking may not show up for several hours. If you’re searching in the first few hours after an arrest and getting no results, that doesn’t confirm the person wasn’t arrested. Wait and search again.
A Note on Third-Party Search Sites
Commercial sites that aggregate jail records across jurisdictions can look convenient, but they pull from official sources on a delay, sometimes charge for information the sheriff’s office posts free, and may carry errors that don’t exist in the source. Confirm anything you find on an aggregator against the official county site.
Federal Arrests
Someone arrested on federal charges won’t appear on any county jail roster. Use the Federal Bureau of Prisons inmate locator, which covers everyone incarcerated in the federal system from 1982 to the present. You can search by name or by a BOP Register Number, which runs five digits, a dash, and three digits.1BOP. Inmate Locator
The name search accepts first, last, and middle names, with optional filters for race, sex, and age.2BOP. Federal Inmates By Name Results show the facility, the register number, and release date information, though release dates may lag behind recalculations under the First Step Act. The locator also accepts DCDC Number, FBI Number, and INS Number searches, which help when someone was transferred into federal custody from another system.1BOP. Inmate Locator
Federal register numbers work like a booking number for practical purposes, but they persist throughout the federal sentence rather than resetting with each arrest.
If the Person Has Been Moved to State Prison
Once someone is convicted and transferred out of the county jail, they drop off the county roster. Each state’s Department of Corrections runs its own inmate search, and the identifier changes: instead of a booking number, the person carries a DOC number or state inmate ID for the length of the sentence. State tools typically search by name, birth year, or DOC number.
If you’re not sure whether the person is still in county custody or has moved, search the county roster first, then the state Department of Corrections site. The transfer can take days or weeks, and there’s sometimes a gap where the person doesn’t appear in either database.
Calling the Facility
When the online search returns nothing or the jail has no public roster, a phone call is the most reliable next step. Call the county sheriff’s office or the specific jail. Larger facilities often have a dedicated inmate information line; smaller ones route the call through a general number.
Have the full name and date of birth ready. Staff can usually tell you whether the person is in custody, the booking number, the charges, and the bond amount. If you’re calling in the first few hours after an arrest, the booking may still be in progress, and staff will typically ask you to try back rather than guess.
For small rural jails without an online roster, calling is often the only realistic option. A visit to the jail’s public information window works too, but the hours are usually limited, especially on weekends, so call ahead to confirm when the window is open.
When You Won’t Find a Booking Number
Some records aren’t public, and searching harder won’t change that. Juvenile arrest and detention records are broadly shielded across the country. The general principle is that youth records are closed to public dissemination unless a specific statutory exception applies.3Office of Justice Programs. Guidelines for Juvenile Information Sharing Some states open certain juvenile records for serious felony offenses, but a minor’s booking number won’t appear on a standard roster search in most jurisdictions.
Sealed and expunged records are the other common wall. Once a court orders a record sealed or expunged, the booking number is removed from public-facing databases. An old arrest that no longer appears online may simply have been sealed. Federal cases tied to ongoing investigations can also be withheld in the early stages, where disclosure could compromise the case.
What the Booking Number Does for You
Once you have the number, it becomes the key to nearly every interaction with the jail. Bail bond companies need it to write a bond. Posting bail directly at the court or jail requires it on the paperwork. Depositing money into a commissary account almost always requires the booking number or a facility-specific inmate ID. Defense attorneys use it to pull their client’s booking documents.
Write it down and keep it accessible. If the person is released and later rearrested, the old number won’t work: each arrest generates a new one, and you’ll need to search again from the start.