WHOIS Lookup
Look up the registrar, dates, nameservers, and status of any domain — or the network and owner of any IP address — over RDAP, the modern successor to WHOIS.
What is a WHOIS lookup?
A WHOIS lookup is the public record for a domain (like example.com) or an IP address (IP, short for Internet Protocol — the numeric address every server on the internet has, such as 8.8.8.8). It tells you who registered it, when it was created, when it expires, and who to contact if something goes wrong. Think of it as the “deed of ownership” for an internet address — anyone can look it up, for free.
This tool fetches that record instantly using RDAP(Registration Data Access Protocol), the modern, official replacement for the old WHOIS system. You don't need to know any of that to use it: just type a name or number, and you get a clean, readable summary.
Why it matters
- See if a domain name is taken. If a lookup returns a registrar and dates, someone already owns it. If it comes back empty, the name may still be available to register.
- Check when your own domain expires. Domains have to be renewed. If you miss the expiry date, you can lose your domain — and someone else can grab it. This tool shows the exact date and how many days are left.
- Spot a suspicious or scam domain. A domain that was registered only a few days ago, but claims to be your bank or a well-known shop, is a classic warning sign. The creation date tells you how old it really is.
- Find out who to report abuse to. If a domain or IP address is sending spam, hosting a phishing page, or attacking you, the record includes an abuse contact — the email address to send your complaint to.
How to use it
- Type a domain name (for example
example.com) or an IP address (for example8.8.8.8) into the box above. You don't need to addhttps://orwww. - Press Lookup (or hit Enter). The tool checks the official registry directly — there is nothing to install and no account to create.
- Read the result. It's laid out in plain cards: registrar, key dates, nameservers, status, and contacts. The next section explains exactly what each one means.
What the results mean
- Registrar
- The company the domain was bought from and is managed through (for example GoDaddy, Cloudflare, or Namecheap).
- Created date
- When the domain was first registered. A very recent date on a domain pretending to be a big brand is a red flag.
- Expiry date
- When the registration runs out and must be renewed. Let this pass and you can lose the domain.
- Updated date
- The last time the record changed — for example a renewal, a transfer, or a nameserver edit.
- Nameservers
- The servers that answer “where does this domain point?” — they reveal which DNS or hosting provider runs the domain (for example
ns1.cloudflare.com). - Status codes
- Standard labels (called EPP status codes — EPP is the protocol registrars use to talk to registries) that describe what the domain is allowed to do. Most are reassuring locks. For example,
clientTransferProhibitedsimply means the domain is locked so it cannot be moved to another owner without the owner's permission — a good thing that prevents hijacking. The tool spells out each code in plain English for you. - Abuse contact
- The email address to contact about spam, phishing, or other abuse coming from the domain or IP address.
- Registrant
- The person or organisation that owns the domain. For privacy reasons this is usually hidden — see the note below.
Why the owner's name is usually hidden (this is normal)
If the registrant(the owner) shows as “redacted”, “not disclosed”, or is simply missing, nothing has gone wrong. Since GDPR — the European privacy law (General Data Protection Regulation) — came into force in 2018, registries hide the personal details of domain owners by default.
The reason is simple: a domain owner's name, home address, email, and phone number are personal data, and publishing them for anyone to scrape would be a privacy and spam risk. So those fields are withheld unless the owner is a company (a business name is often still shown) or has actively chosen to publish their details. You will still reliably get the registrar, the dates, the nameservers, the status codes, and an abuse contact — which is everything you need for the things people actually use a WHOIS lookup for. This tool only ever shows what the registry returns; it never guesses or makes up the hidden fields.
Behind the scenes, and where to go next
For the curious: for decades this data came from the legacy WHOIS protocol, which returned messy free text with no standard format. RDAP (Registration Data Access Protocol) is its modern, standardised replacement — it returns clean, structured data over a secure connection and is the system ICANN (the body that oversees domain names) now requires registries to run. This tool talks to RDAP directly, so what you see comes straight from the authoritative registry, not from a third-party database.
You can also look up an IP address. For an IP, the lookup goes to the regional registry responsible for that block of addresses (ARIN, RIPE NCC, APNIC, LACNIC, or AFRINIC) and returns the network range, the owning organisation, the country, and the abuse contact — exactly what you need to identify or report whoever runs an address.
When you're done here, run a full DNS and email security scan, look up a domain's records with the DNS lookup tool, or verify its signing chain with the DNSSEC checker.