How to Find Live Webcams Using Google

Find open, unsecured webcams with these search tips

Live video stream illustration

ET-ARTWORKS / DigitalVision Vectors / Getty Images

by Tim Fisher
Tim Fisher has 30+ years' professional technology support experience. He writes troubleshooting content and is the General Manager of Lifewire.
Updated July 24, 2019

You can perform a webcam search from Google to locate open/unsecured IP cameras. However, because Google kicks back billions of search results for most queries, you need to know exactly what to search for to find live webcams.

A Google webcam search is helpful if you're curious about life in other places. There's a wide variety of fascinating cameras sending live feeds covering all sorts of things, from traffic and weather to North Pole researchers, parking lots, airports, African watering holes, zoos, campuses, beaches, and everything in between.

If you're not sure what kind of open webcam feed to search for, take a look at these at-home webcams or these cams from around the world — no searching required.

If the webcam sites you find with Google don't open properly, try using a computer. Most mobile devices don't support the same video streams that you can open from a computer.

Webcam Search Tips

Searching for just webcams might yield some results, but you're much better off exploring open webcams on Google using targeted search terms.

Try a General Search

Before trying advanced search tips, enter the basic words related to the webcam feed you want to find.

eagle cam
eagle webcam
Rockies webcam
fireworks cam

If those webcam searches aren't helpful, try throwing in the word live or surrounding the phrase in quotes:

"live bird camera"
"mountain webcam live"
"pacific beach" "weather cam"
"powered by webcamXP"

Search in URLs

Google lets you search within URLs with the inurl command. Most webcam pages use a similar structure in the URL, making this webcam search tip pretty helpful.

inurl:/view.shtml france
inurl:view/index.shtml rome
inurl:/view/index2.shtml
inurl:view/view.shtml beach
inurl:appletvid.html
inurl:8081 "live view"
inurl:8080 "live view"
intitle:”live view” intitle:axis
inurl:CgiStart?page=Single
inurl:MultiCameraFrame?Mode=Motion
inurl:ViewerFrame?Mode=Motion

Search Web Page Titles

Another way to locate webcams on Google is to search within each page's title. This is possible with the intitle command.

intitle:"Network Camera NetworkCamera"
intitle:"live webcam" zoo
intitle:"Live View / – AXIS"

This is an extremely simple search that reveals a surprising number of results:

intitle:liveapplet

Combine Search Commands

You can really narrow down your webcam searches by combining multiple search operators into one query. However, the more commands you add, the fewer results you'll see, which could eliminate valid webcam feeds that don't match your search exactly.

inurl:view/view.shtml site:edu
inurl:view/view.shtml site:gov
site:gov inurl:"live camera"
site:gov intitle:"traffic cameras" texas
intitle:EvoCam inurl:webcam.html