# API: Search by email using "List Contacts"?

**URL:** <https://forum.mautic.org/t/api-search-by-email-using-list-contacts/6776>\
**Category:** Product Support\
**Created:** [December 7, 2016, 5:03am UTC](https://forum.mautic.org/t/api-search-by-email-using-list-contacts/6776 "2016-12-07T05:03:34Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![olimits7](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forum.mautic.org/olimits7/32/3071_2.png) [@olimits7](https://forum.mautic.org/u/olimits7)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2016, 5:03am UTC](https://forum.mautic.org/t/api-search-by-email-using-list-contacts/6776/1 "2016-12-07T05:03:34Z")

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Hi,  
  
  
  
I see the " **Get Contact** API call only works with the “ **contact id** ” value; can I use the " **List Contacts** API call to search for a user using their “ **email address** ”?  
  
  
  
Thank you!

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![olimits7](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forum.mautic.org/olimits7/32/3071_2.png) [@olimits7](https://forum.mautic.org/u/olimits7)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2016, 5:03am UTC](https://forum.mautic.org/t/api-search-by-email-using-list-contacts/6776/2 "2016-12-07T05:03:34Z")

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Hi,

I see the "Get Contact API call only works with the “contact id” value; can I use the "List Contacts API call to search for a user using their “email address”?

Thank you!

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![tiennhatnguyen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@tiennhatnguyen](https://forum.mautic.org/u/tiennhatnguyen)\
**Post date:** [August 1, 2017, 1:49am UTC](https://forum.mautic.org/t/api-search-by-email-using-list-contacts/6776/3 "2017-08-01T01:49:06Z")

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Yes, you can.  
/api/contacts?search=emailToSearch

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**Author:** ![ldev](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/b38774/32.png) [@ldev](https://forum.mautic.org/u/ldev)\
**Post date:** [October 27, 2020, 11:55am UTC](https://forum.mautic.org/t/api-search-by-email-using-list-contacts/6776/4 "2020-10-27T11:55:33Z")

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Problem with this - I can specify email of another person as my “city” for example - and above search api call will return … 2 records, including the one where I added email as a “city” field - because I think it searches across multiple fields by default.

This may or may lead to security risks as you can accidentally email sensitive data to a wrong recipient if implemented directly as shown above.

It looks like to ONLY search by email - you’d have to do somthing like this, ex:

```
$contacts = $contactApi->getList("email:$email", 0, 30, $orderBy='email', $orderByDir='asc', $publishedOnly=false, $minimal=false);

```

^ note: you have to add `email:` prefix to only search email column.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![trainerday](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forum.mautic.org/trainerday/32/9538_2.png) [@trainerday](https://forum.mautic.org/u/trainerday)\
**Post date:** [March 31, 2023, 8:17pm UTC](https://forum.mautic.org/t/api-search-by-email-using-list-contacts/6776/5 "2023-03-31T20:17:44Z")

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A simple solution is just to use the add contact method

api/contacts/new {email:xxxxx} and it will return the ID of the contact. 🙂

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**Author:** ![imog](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forum.mautic.org/imog/32/3813_2.png) [@imog](https://forum.mautic.org/u/imog)\
**Post date:** [January 12, 2025, 10:10am UTC](https://forum.mautic.org/t/api-search-by-email-using-list-contacts/6776/6 "2025-01-12T10:10:12Z")

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> [@ldev](#):
>
> `getList("email:$email")`

I suggest to use “email:+$email” for the query to not get similar results.