Domain Availability Checker
Check whether a domain name is free to register. Asks the registry directly, so a parked or unpublished name is not mistaken for an available one.
Enter the domain you want to check, including the extension — myidea.com.
Related tools
All Network tools →This tool queries an external service to answer your request. Only the value you enter — such as a domain or IP address — is sent. Your other data stays on your device.
This tool reads public records — DNS, WHOIS and certificate data that registries and servers publish openly. It sends nothing to the host you enter and changes nothing there. Use it on infrastructure you own or are authorised to look into.
About the Domain Availability Checker
Check whether a domain name is already registered before you build anything around it. Type the name with its extension, and get back a straight answer about whether somebody already holds it.
The answer comes from the registry for that extension — the authoritative record of who holds what — rather than from DNS. That distinction matters more than it sounds. A DNS-based check asks only whether the name resolves to anything right now, and a domain can be registered and simply not published: parked, held by a company that has not launched, or bought and left dark deliberately. All of those resolve to nothing and look free from the outside. Asking the registry avoids that whole class of wrong answer.
What a registry check still cannot tell you is the price. Registries classify short names, dictionary words and other desirable strings as premium and charge well above the standard registration fee for them, sometimes by thousands. Availability and price are separate questions, and the second one is only ever answered at a registrar's checkout.
Which is why this tool says looks available rather than available. The registry is authoritative about this moment, not about the moment you reach a checkout — names are registered continuously, and no availability checker anywhere, including this one, can promise you a name that a registrar has not yet sold you. If the answer comes back taken, the WHOIS tool will show you who holds it and when the registration expires, which is the thing worth knowing if you want the name enough to wait for it.
How to use the Domain Availability Checker
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Type the name
Enter the full domain including the extension — myidea.com, not myidea. The extension is part of the name and different extensions are registered separately.
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Run the check
Complete the verification check and press Check availability. The answer comes from the registry for that extension, not from DNS.
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Confirm before you commit
If it looks available, confirm at a registrar before you build a brand on it. If it is taken, our WHOIS tool shows who holds it and when it expires.
Frequently asked questions
It said available, but the registrar says it is taken. What happened?
Most often the name was registered in the gap between your check and your purchase — popular names go continuously, and a registry answer describes the moment it was asked. Less often the registry reports the name as free while the registrar declines to sell it, which happens with names held back for auction or restricted to a particular class of registrant. This is exactly why the tool says "looks available" rather than "available", and why the only answer that settles it is a registrar completing the sale.
Does this check DNS or the registry?
The registry for that extension — the authoritative record of who holds what. A DNS-based check asks only whether the name resolves to anything at this moment, which is a much weaker question: a domain that has been bought and parked, or registered by a company that has not launched, resolves to nothing and looks free. Asking the registry avoids that entire class of wrong answer, and it is the reason this tool gives one answer rather than offering you a choice of methods.
The name is available but the registrar wants a very high price. Why?
It is a premium domain. Registries classify short names, dictionary words and other desirable strings as premium and price them well above the standard registration fee, sometimes by thousands. Availability and price are separate questions, and no availability checker can tell you the price — that only appears at the registrar, which is one more reason to confirm there before planning around a name.
Can I check several extensions at once?
Not in a single run — each check is a separate lookup against a separate registry, because .com and .co.uk are entirely different registration systems that happen to share a name in front of them. Run the ones you care about individually. The result for one extension tells you nothing about another.
Does checking a name here make it more likely to be taken?
No. Domain front-running — where a name you searched for is registered by someone who saw the search — was a real problem years ago at some registrars, and it is the reason people still worry about it. We do not sell domains, we have no interest in the names you check, and we do not store them. The lookup service is a data provider, not a registrar.
Why is there a verification check before I can use this?
Because every check is a paid API call on our side, and a name-availability tool is exactly the kind of page someone points a script at to test tens of thousands of candidate names. Without a gate the cost of that would be ours. For an ordinary visitor the check is usually invisible and needs no action.