WHOIS Lookup

WHOIS is a lookup system that gives you access to a domain name's registration data: the registrar, the creation date, the expiry date, the name servers and the status codes. RDAP (Registration Data Access Protocol) is the next-generation access protocol that has replaced WHOIS for generic top-level domains such as .com, .net and .org, serving the same kind of information in a more structured and standardised way. For country-code extensions (ccTLDs), the lookup system in use depends on the policy of the registry concerned.

A WHOIS or RDAP lookup on a domain name can give you:

• The registrar the domain was registered through
• The registration date
• The expiry date
• The date it was last updated
• The name server records
• The domain status codes (EPP codes)
• The registrar's abuse contact address

Personal contact details belonging to the domain owner (name, address, email, phone) are in most cases not displayed, or are masked behind a privacy service, because of privacy policies and data protection law.

Every lookup shows the domain name itself, the registrar, the registration, update and expiry dates, the name server records, the domain status codes and the registrar's abuse contact. The owner's name, address, email and phone appear only when privacy protection is off — since 2018 those fields have been masked under most extensions.

If privacy protection is off, and depending on the policies of the extension, the registry, the registrar and the applicable data protection law, you can usually reach:

• The domain owner's first and last name
• Their address
• Their email address
• Their phone number

If privacy protection is on, personal details may be masked, redacted or replaced with the anonymous contact details of a privacy service. Even with privacy active, however, the following usually stays visible — so "no information at all can be seen" is not accurate:

• The domain name itself
• The registrar's name
• The registration and expiry dates
• The last updated date
• The name server records
• The domain status codes
• The registrar's abuse contact address

It may still be possible to reach the domain owner through the anonymous channel the privacy or proxy service provides. How and whether messages are forwarded depends on that provider's policy.

In most lookups, no. Data protection law keeps the owner's name and contact details out of the result; what you get is the registrar that sold the name, the registration and expiry dates, the name servers and the status codes.

A route to the owner remains open: the registrar's abuse contact, or the anonymous channel of the privacy service where one is in use. Corporate (legal-person) registrations and some country extensions can fall outside the restriction, so what you see varies from extension to extension.

Type the domain name into the search box above and press Enter; the record appears within a few seconds. The tool is free for more than 1,000 extensions, including .com, .net, .de, .ru, .me, .uk and .cn.

What happens behind it: the lookup is sent from permitted addresses to the registry that runs the extension, or to its official WHOIS/RDAP server, and is answered from the registration data held in the registrar or registry system. The result screen also names which source answered and when the query was made.

People use this to contact a website, to resolve disputes, or to trace abuse. It can also give you an early read on whether a name is registered — but final availability should be confirmed with a real-time domain name check, because the absence of a WHOIS/RDAP record does not by itself mean a name is free to register (it may be reserved, premium or blocked by the registry).

RDAP is the standardised successor to WHOIS. WHOIS returns plain text over port 43; RDAP serves the same data as structured JSON over HTTPS, and which server to ask is defined by the protocol itself. Since 28 January 2025 RDAP has been the definitive source of registration data for generic extensions.

RDAP was developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) to address the shortcomings of WHOIS. Its notable properties:

• It returns responses in a standard, machine-readable JSON format
• It supports international characters and domain names more reliably
• It standardises querying and referral (which server to ask is clearly defined)
• It is suited to authenticated, tiered access — so different groups of users can be served different levels of data

WHOIS and RDAP data is not held in one central ICANN database; it lives in the systems of the relevant registry (the organisation running the extension) and registrar (the company that sells and registers the name). ICANN sets the policy and contractual framework for this ecosystem; it does not store the data itself.

Domain status codes (EPP codes) are a separate classification showing a domain's current state — transfer lock, suspension, deletion process and so on — and are listed as part of the WHOIS/RDAP output.

WHOIS privacy (also called WHOIS protection) is a service that keeps the domain owner's personal contact details out of public lookup results. With privacy off, those details become visible to anyone, which increases exposure to spam and unwanted marketing email.

Turning privacy on is a personal choice, but it is generally recommended so that personal data is not misused. Even with privacy active, the information ICANN requires — the registrar name, the relevant WHOIS/RDAP server and the abuse contact address — stays visible; only the personal details of the registrant and the technical and billing contacts are hidden.

Your WHOIS details can usually be updated in your registrar's control panel, under the domain list, in the domain management section. Keeping them current matters both for complying with ICANN rules and for receiving WHOIS-related correspondence at the right address.

ICANN requires registrants to keep contact details current and to respond to verification requests. Deliberately supplying false information, failing to update details that have changed, or not responding to verification requests can, under certain conditions, lead to the domain being suspended or cancelled. Users can complain about incomplete or incorrect WHOIS data, and registrars are obliged to investigate and correct such complaints promptly.

WHOIS information depends largely on the registrant keeping it current. If contact details have changed and were never updated, what the lookup returns may not reflect reality. That is why it is important to verify WHOIS data before relying on it in anything critical, such as a legal filing.

The expiry date shown in a WHOIS or RDAP result does not mean the domain becomes free that same day. Depending on the extension it may pass through auto-renewal, a renewal grace period, redemption and deletion. The date a name returns to general availability cannot be calculated precisely from the WHOIS result alone.

Yes. You can use our WHOIS lookup tool free of charge for every supported domain extension, with no account and no sign-up.

You cannot register a domain directly through our lookup tool. If a lookup shows the name is available, you can buy it through our sponsor registrar.

WHOIS data is generally based on publicly available registration records. For domains with a privacy service active, the amount of personal information a lookup can reach is limited.

You can look up more than 1,000 extensions, including .com, .net, .de, .ru, .me, .uk and .cn — and see the registration date, the domain age, the expiry date, the registrar and whether the name is locked.

• Registry: the organisation that centrally operates a domain extension (.com or .com.tr, for example).
• Registrar: the company that sells and registers domain names — the one a customer deals with directly.
• Registrant: the registered owner of the domain name.

WHOIS reads a domain's registration record: who registered it, when it expires, which registrar holds it. A DNS lookup reads where the name currently resolves: A, AAAA, MX and TXT records. One tells you the administrative truth, the other the technical one; you will find both on separate tabs of this page.

Some ccTLD registries do not publish EPP status codes, or use formats of their own. If you see no codes, that does not mean the domain carries no locks — only that the registry does not share them. In that situation we leave the field empty rather than guessing.