Domain name lookup (RDAP)

A bit paranoid? You have finally found the name. It is short, it is right, it is free — you think. And now you have to type it into a registrar's search box, the one that belongs to a company whose business is selling domains, and wait a day or two before deciding. Search a name, see it registered the next week by someone who "just happened" to want it too: everyone who has hunted for a name has heard that story, and whether or not it is true of any given registrar, the doubt is enough to spoil the search.

So this tool asks the registry directly. RDAP is the protocol the registries themselves publish — the successor of WHOIS, in JSON — and every top-level domain has a public RDAP server that answers "who holds this name" or "nobody". No account, no middleman, no search box that belongs to a seller. You type the name, the lookup goes to the right registry for the ending you chose, and the answer comes back: free, taken (and since when, and until when), or reserved.

Nothing is stored. The name you are looking for stays between you and the registry, which already knows every name it holds and gains nothing from yours.