Sometimes the EXIF data embedded in an image file can help you determine the location but there’s another alternative that is more likely to work. You probably know that Google offers Similar Image search to help discover images that are visually similar to your source image. The same feature of Google Images can sometimes help you uncover the location of a photograph as well.

Go to images.google.com and drag* any image – either from your desktop or another web page – to the search box (see video for a quick demo). If that photograph is of some popular destination, Google will mention the possible location of that image above the search results (see screenshot). In all other cases, you will at least know the original source of that image and that could offer enough hints for you to guess the actual location on your own.

[*] IE may not support drag and drop but in that case, you can click the “camera icon” in the Google search box to manually upload a picture to Google Images for analysis.