How to verify a professional license

Verifying a professional license means confirming that a person or business is currently authorized by a government agency to practice a regulated occupation. It protects consumers from unlicensed practitioners and helps employers meet due-diligence and credentialing requirements.

Start with the license number or name

The fastest way to verify a license is by its license or credential number, which returns a single, exact record. If you do not have the number, you can search by the professional’s last name (and first name) or, for a company, its business name. On USLicenseCheck you can do all three, scoped to one state or across every supported state at once.

Check the status and expiration

A valid license is typically marked “Active” (some states use “Current” or “Qualified”). Look closely at two fields: the status and the expiration date. A license can be technically “Active” but close to expiring, or “Expired,” “Inactive,” “Lapsed,” or “Suspended.” Each of those means the professional is not fully authorized to practice today.

Confirm the profession and scope

License types matter. A “Registered Nurse (RN)” license is different from an “Advanced Practice” or “Licensed Practical Nurse” credential, and a general contractor license does not authorize electrical work. Make sure the license type matches the work you are relying on.

Always confirm with the issuing board

Aggregators like USLicenseCheck make records fast to find, but licensing status can change at any moment, and the authoritative source is always the state licensing board that issued the license. For hiring, legal, or credentialing decisions, confirm the record directly on the official state portal (we link to each one on the relevant state page and on our Data Sources page).

What you cannot rely on a lookup for

A license lookup confirms licensure status. It is not a background check, a criminal-history report, or a consumer report under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), and it should never be used to make FCRA-covered decisions.