Look up a domain name, and see who holds it.

From the registry that holds the extension, through RDAP — the public lookup service registries run for exactly this purpose. Nothing is passed through a third party, and the answer is cached for a few minutes so that checking the same name twice does not ask twice.

Because almost no registry publishes it any more, and the few that still do publish things like a private individual's home address. We show what a domain says about its own registration — the registrar, the dates, the locks and the nameservers — and not the person behind it. If you need to reach a holder, most registrars run a contact form that forwards a message without disclosing the address.

A registry has to register a lookup service with IANA for it to be readable this way, and not every one has. Among the extensions we sell, .io, .co and .me are the ones people ask about most. There is nothing wrong with those names — the record simply is not published anywhere we can read it.

It is the registrar lock, and it is on by default at any competent registrar. It stops the name being moved away without the holder switching it off first, which is the single most effective protection against domain theft. It is not a fault, and it does not stop you transferring a name you hold — you turn it off, take the auth code, and start the move.

Not yet, and usually not for a while. An expired name goes through a grace period in which the holder can still renew it, then a redemption period of about thirty days in which they can recover it at a fee, and only then is it deleted. The status column tells you which of those stages it is in.

Yes, and this page will show you the same public record anybody else sees. What you hold with us is in your account, where the nameservers, the lock and the auth code are yours to change.