How to remove your home address from Google search

If you want to remove your home address from Google search, the first thing to know is that Google is rarely where the problem starts. Google indexes pages other people publish: a people-search listing, a county parcel page, an old club newsletter, a business profile you set up years ago. Each of those has a different fix, and some fixes belong to Google while most belong to the website that holds the page.

So the routine below starts with an inventory, sorts each result by where it comes from, and only then reaches for Google's own tools. Features and menu names are as Google describes them on its help pages at the time of writing. If a button has moved by the time you read this, the help pages linked here are the place to check.

Privacy toolkit for this job

• NordPassEmail Masking (Premium and Family plans) gives each form its own forwarding address, so brokers never get your main inbox.Start with NordPass
• Identity-blocking roller stamp (3 pack)Blacks out your name and address on labels, so the addresses you remove don't leave in the recycling.On Amazon

Picked from published documentation and reviews, not our own testing. We earn a commission from some services we link to. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. The full Privacy kit

Step 1: Take a ten-minute inventory

Open a private browser window so your own history does not shape the results, and run these searches:

1. Your street address in quotation marks, with and without the city.
2. Your full name with your city, then with your state.
3. Your name with any former city where you lived in the past ten years.
4. A maiden name, nickname or middle-name version, if you use one.

For each result that shows your address, write down three things: the page address, the website it sits on, and what kind of site it is. Do this on paper or in a spreadsheet, not from memory. When I worked in compliance, the habit that saved the most time was writing the request down the day it was sent; it is the same here.

You are only searching for yourself. Do not enter a relative's or a neighbor's details "while you are at it". If you are worried about a family member, help them run the same routine for themselves.

Privacy kit

• The Art of Invisibility (Kevin Mitnick)A readable overview of tracking and how to limit it.On Amazon
• Wall-mount locking mailboxKeeps bank letters, new cards and tax forms out of reach of mail thieves.On Amazon
• 12-sheet cross-cut paper shredderOld statements, pre-approved credit offers and medical bills stop being readable trash.On Amazon

Chosen from specifications, policies and published reviews; we have not tested these ourselves. More in the Privacy kit

Step 2: Sort each result by where it comes from

Most results fall into one of the rows below. The right-hand column is where the fix actually happens.

Step 3: Fix the source first, then Google

For people-search listings, which are the most common result, the order matters. If you ask Google to drop a result while the listing is still live, the page still exists, still shows up on other search engines and is still for sale as a "full report". If you remove it at the source first, Google tends to catch up on its own, and you have a clean answer if the result lingers.

The opt-out routes for the large people-search sites are in our guide to removing your information from people-search sites, and the opt-out checklist keeps track of which ones you have finished. Do the sites that appeared in your inventory first, then the rest.

Once a site confirms the removal, give it a few days and search again. If Google still shows your address in the snippet, use Google's refresh outdated content request. Google says the tool is for pages that no longer exist or have changed significantly, and that it is not for pages where the information is still live. That is exactly why the source comes first.

Step 4: Use Results about you for what remains

Google's Results about you tool is built for this job. Its help page says it looks for results that show your phone number, home address or email address, lets you request removal of each one, and can notify you when new matching results appear. Google says the tool is rolling out to users over 18 in certain markets, so availability depends on where you live.

Three settings make the difference for addresses:

• Enter every address, not just the current one. Listings often show a place you left years ago. If the tool does not know that address, it cannot match the page.
• Turn on notifications. This is how you hear about a listing that comes back.
• Copy each request's status into your log. Google shows requests as In progress, Approved, Denied or Undone.

An approved request does not always remove the page from every search. Google says that when a page also has content of value to the public, it may remove it only for searches that include your name. I covered the tool screen by screen in Google's Results about you tool: what it removes and what it can't.

If a result does not qualify through the tool, Google's page on removing personal information from Search has a detailed request form. It covers contact details as well as doxxing, where your information appears alongside threats or calls to harass you. If you feel unsafe, report the threat to local police as well; a removal from Search does not deal with the person behind it.

Step 5: Maps, Street View and business listings

Maps is its own corner, and people often mix it up with Search.

The "Home" label. If you saved your address as Home in Google Maps, Google says only you can see it. You can remove it at any time from the Personal info section of your Google Account. It is not what strangers see.

Your house in Street View. Google lets the owner or tenant of a home request a blur. Open the Street View image of your home, choose "Report a problem" at the bottom right, select your home as the subject and fill in the form. Google asks for proof of address, such as a utility bill, bank statement, lease, homeowners insurance or property tax record, and says documents should be dated within the last six months (leases excepted). Two things to know before you submit: Google says the blur is permanent, and it says the documents you upload are deleted after 60 days.

A Business Profile at your home address. If you run a business from home and set up a Google Business Profile, your address may be public because you put it there. Google's rule for service-area businesses is that if you do not receive customers at your address, you must hide it. In the profile, open the location settings, select the edit icon next to "Business location" and turn off "Show business address to customers". The profile then shows your service area instead.

A place pin that should not exist. If Maps shows your house as a business or point of interest, use "Suggest an edit" on the place and the option for a place that is closed or not there.

Privacy kit

• Identity-blocking roller stamp (3 pack)Hides your name and address on labels and letters before they go in the bin.On Amazon
• The Art of Invisibility (Kevin Mitnick)A readable overview of tracking and how to limit it.On Amazon
• 12-sheet cross-cut paper shredderOld statements, pre-approved credit offers and medical bills stop being readable trash.On Amazon

Chosen from specifications, policies and published reviews; we have not tested these ourselves. More in the Privacy kit

What Google will not remove

Knowing the limits saves you from requests that will only come back denied.

• Government and educational pages. Google treats these as valuable to the public. A county assessor page that shows your name and parcel is the classic example. The fix, if one exists, is at the office: some states let certain people, such as survivors of violence or some public officials, shield their address in property records. Wendell explains how that works in why your home address is public record.
• News. Google generally leaves news results up. Ask the publisher if a story exposes your address without good reason.
• Things you control. If the address is on your own social profile or site, Google expects you to remove it there.
• The page itself. Every Google removal affects Google Search only. The page can still be reached directly or through other search engines, which run their own indexes.

One exception works in your favor. If a site demands payment to take down information about you, Google has a policy for exploitative removal sites. It says it will consider removal when you are the subject of the page, the site is not a business review site, and the site requires payment to have the content removed. Never pay a site to remove your own listing.

How long it takes

Most people-search opt-outs finish within a few days, though a few sites say they need up to two weeks. Google sends an email when it receives a Results about you request and another when it decides, and it warns that an approved result can take a little while to drop out of Search. Street View blurs have no published timeline; Google says it reviews reports as fast as it can and may email you if it needs more information. Put a reminder in your calendar a week after each batch of requests rather than checking every day.

Your next quarter, in five lines

1. Run the four inventory searches again in a private window.
2. Opt out at the source for anything new.
3. Refresh any stale Google snippet.
4. Check the Results about you request list for denials and re-file where it makes sense.
5. Note the date, so the next round starts from your log instead of from scratch.

Your next three steps

1. Log this request in the opt-out checklist, with the date to look again.
2. Give the next opt-out form its own address: NordPass Email Masking (Premium and Family plans) forwards to your inbox and can be switched off later.
3. Roll an identity-blocking stamp over labels and letters before they go out, so the address you just removed doesn't leave in the recycling.