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Permit Report » Permits by City » Philadelphia

Philadelphia Building Permit Search & History Reports

Philadelphia's Department of Licenses & Inspections (L&I) issues all building permits within city limits. The city publishes its full L&I Permits dataset on OpenDataPhilly — over 900,000 records searchable by address, permit number, and permit type. Records cover new construction, residential renovations, demolitions, electrical, plumbing, and commercial fitouts across all 10 city council districts and 65 neighborhoods. Philadelphia's permit history is especially dense in its row-house stock: the city has more than 60,000 occupied rowhomes, and L&I records often reveal decades of incremental work — rear additions, basement conversions, and rooftop ADUs. L&I's online portal (li.phila.gov) is notoriously difficult to search by address across time; PermitReport queries the open-data API directly for complete history.

Live data direct from Philadelphia Licenses & Inspections (L&I) · Results in seconds

Records available

What's included in a Philadelphia permit search.

L&I issued permits from OpenDataPhilly open data: residential renovations, commercial fitouts, new construction, demolition, electrical, plumbing, and mechanical. Includes permit number, issue date, declared cost, permit type, and status.

Source: Philadelphia Licenses & Inspections (L&I) https://li.phila.gov

  • Permit type and scope of work Full description of the work covered by each permit
  • Issue date, final date, current status Track open vs. finaled vs. expired permits
  • Contractor name & license Where recorded — required for PA permits
  • Original PDF document (Premium tier) Certified copy from Philadelphia Licenses & Inspections (L&I)
Coverage limits

What this search does not include.

Suburban townships (Lower Merion, Radnor, Cheltenham — separate jurisdictions); permits still in active review; pre-database paper records (generally pre-1990).

  • Outside Philadelphia, PA jurisdiction Adjacent counties and municipalities use separate systems
  • Pending / in-review permits Not yet issued — not in the public records database
  • Unpermitted work Not in the records — flagged via history gaps, not direct data
  • Voided / expired (cleared) records Philadelphia may clear old records from public view after a retention period
Common questions

Frequently asked about Philadelphia permits.

How far back do Philadelphia L&I records go?
OpenDataPhilly's L&I Permits dataset contains records going back to the 1980s for most permit types, though data quality and completeness improve significantly after 2000.
Why is the L&I portal so hard to use?
L&I's public portal (li.phila.gov) requires knowing the exact permit number or certificate number, and doesn't support full address-history searches across time. PermitReport queries the underlying open-data API for complete address-level history.
Can unpermitted additions be detected in Philadelphia?
Yes — cross-reference L&I permit history with the Philadelphia Office of Property Assessment (OPA) records. Row-house rear additions and basement unit conversions are the most common unpermitted patterns in Philadelphia.
Does Philadelphia require contractor registration?
Yes — contractors must be licensed with the Pennsylvania Attorney General and registered with L&I. License numbers are recorded on most commercial and residential permits.
Can I get the actual permit PDF?
L&I issues physical and digital permit documents. Our Premium tier retrieves available permit documents directly from L&I records.

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