Consent searches (or consensual searches) are searches made by law enforcement officers in the United States based on the voluntary consent of the individual whose person or property is being searched. The simplest and most common type of warrantless searches in the United States are searches based upon consent. No warrant, probable cause or reasonable suspicion is required to perform a search if a person, or someone else with the proper authority, consents to a search.

A consent search assumes the individual, whose person or property is being searched, is aware that they have the right to refuse a search in a situation when confronted by law enforcement agents. By giving consent they are assumed to waive, freely and voluntarily, his or her Fourth Amendment rights, granting the officer permission to perform the search. Where consent is obtained through "deception" on the part of the police officer, the search may be determined to be an unreasonable search in violation of the Fourth Amendment.

The three main categories of searches are a search of a house, automobile or pedestrian. In the case of an automobile, it is assumed the officer has already seized the car and the encounter is a Terry stop. When an officer returns a driver's identification, the encounter has been transformed into a consensual encounter. In the case of a pedestrian, a consensual encounter can lead to a Terry stop based on information gathered during conversation. Some states and cities pass laws that require officer to notify a right to refuse in one case, but not the others.

The person has the right to refuse to give consent, and except in limited cases may revoke consent at any point during the search. In addition, the prosecution in any trial using the search results as evidence is required to prove that the consent was voluntary and not a result of coercion.

In contrast to Miranda rights, officers conducting a consent search are not required to warn people of their right to withhold consent in order for consent to be valid, as determined by the U.S. Supreme Court in Schneckloth v. Bustamonte. Police are not required to conduct a search in a way that gives the individual an opportunity to revoke consent, as determined in United States v. Rich, where the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit rejected the argument that "officials must conduct all searches in plain view of the suspect, and in a manner slowly enough that he may withdraw or delimit his consent at any time during the search."