WHOIS Lookup
Who registered a domain, where, and — the part that actually bites — exactly how many days are left before it expires.
What WHOIS data is — and is not — anymore
WHOIS is the public registry record created when a domain is registered: registrar, registration and expiry dates, status codes and nameservers. A decade ago it also showed the registrant's name, address and email, which is why old hands remember it as a people-lookup. Since GDPR and ICANN's redaction rules, personal details are hidden for most domains — what remains public, and what this tool shows, is the operational data. That is not a lesser version of WHOIS; for keeping a domain alive, the operational data is the part that matters.
Technically, this tool speaks RDAP, the structured protocol registries now publish instead of the old free-text WHOIS port. Same facts, but machine-readable — no scraping, no mangled formats, and dates you can trust enough to do arithmetic on, like the days-to-expiry count above.
The expiry date is the whole ballgame
Domains almost never die from attacks. They die from a lapsed card on file, an auto-renew that was never on, a registrar email going to someone who left the company. When a domain expires, everything expires with it at once: website, email, every service verified against it — and after the grace and redemption windows (typically ~75 days total, with rising fees), anyone on earth can register it. Businesses have lost their own names to patient drop-catchers for the price of forgetting one renewal.
The two-minute hygiene routine: confirm the expiry date here, turn on auto-renew at the registrar, enable the transfer lock (the status this tool checks for), and make sure the registrar account email belongs to a role, not a person. Then let something watch the date for you — expiry countdown is one of the checks UptimeVitals runs continuously, because a date everyone saw once and nobody tracked is how these stories always start.
Reading the status codes
clientTransferProhibited is the registrar lock — good, keep it on. clientDeleteProhibited and clientUpdateProhibited are stronger locks usually set during disputes or at the owner's request. pendingTransfer or pendingDelete on a domain you own and did not act on is a five-alarm fire: contact the registrar immediately. Statuses vary by registry, but any "pending" you did not start deserves a phone call the same day.
WHOIS Lookup — frequently asked questions
Why can't I see the owner's name and email?
Privacy redaction. Most registries now hide personal data by law or policy. To contact an owner, use the registrar's relay contact form (most registrars forward messages to the registrant) or the contact address published on the domain's own website.
How accurate is the expiry date?
It comes straight from the registry's RDAP record — the authoritative source. If it disagrees with your registrar's panel, believe the registry and open a ticket, because the registry date is the one that decides.
What happens at each stage after expiry?
Typically: the domain stops resolving (website/email down), a ~30–45 day grace period allows normal-price renewal, then a ~30-day redemption period allows renewal at a steep fee, then pending-delete, then it drops and anyone can register it. Exact windows vary by TLD.
Can I check if a domain is available to register?
Indirectly: if this lookup finds no record, the domain is very likely unregistered (some registries withhold data, so confirm at a registrar before celebrating). If it finds a record, the domain is taken — check the expiry to see if it might lapse.
Does this work for all TLDs?
Most major ones publish RDAP. A minority of country-code registries still run old-style WHOIS only; for those, this tool reports that no RDAP record was found.