What Domain Names Can Be Checked For Availability
Most domain names can be checked, however in some cases it is unknown for various technical reasons.
Some examples:,wikipedia.org,apple.com,youtube.com,
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Whys It Necessary To Have A Whois Database
The ability to find domain info quickly and accurately is important for a couple main reasons: 1. A WHOIS check is essential for people in the business of buying and selling domains. These individuals need a method of communication for their transactions. A WHOIS search will provide one or more methods for reaching the current owner of a web address. 2. The WHOIS database is a way to maintain accountability for people who operate online. For example, if you felt someone was using your trademarks on their website, the WHOIS database provides a number of ways to resolve that dispute.
How To Find The Right Domain Name
How do you reserve a perfect domain name for your company? It should represent your brand and its goals on the internet. You can spend days looking for the perfect name options, only to be met with the worst disappointment when you finally find it. It has already been stolen. At first, your aspirations for a profitable internet presence are dashed. As a result, we strongly advise double-checking if the website youve chosen is available. Depending on your requirements, you can choose from over 1,000 possible verified domain extensions .
- Keep it short and simple. The maximum number of characters in a website URL is 63. The bare minimum is one character. The URL needs to speak of your brand, but it shouldnt be long enough to become off-putting. You can use our tool to shorten the URL while retaining your brand value.
- Sometimes you will know which direction you want your naming scheme to be in but cannot put your finger on what fits right. You can use a domain name generator to get a couple of ideas.
- You can pick from multiple top-level domain extensions to target the right audience. If youre catering solely to the people of the UK, consider a co.uk instead of a .com. Take your pick with our domain name generator tool!
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What Do I Need To Register A Domain Name With Hostinger
At Hostinger, there are no special requirements for domain registration. We only require basic contact information and a valid payment method.
You dont even have to be an existing customer of ours if you want to use Hostingers domain checker and buy a domain. You register your domain with us but point it to another hosting provider.
Placing A Domain Name Bid
Sometimes the domain you want will already be owned by someone else. If the domain isnt being used for an existing website or application, then you can usually get in touch with the owner and place a bid on the domain.
For example, heres the website of a domain name that someone else owns. You have the option to reach out and purchase the domain.
Keep in mind that the owner might not always respond, or they might want more than youre willing to spend. Generally, when you place a bid youll be spending a couple of hundred bucks at the very minimum. Sometimes these domains will run up into multiple thousands of dollars.
For example, take a look at some of these domains offered on Sedo.
Overall, the price of domains will go up the simpler they are. Youd be hard pressed to find a single word domain of a dictionary word for less than a few grand.
If youre placing a bid on a domain name, expect a little negotiation back and forth until you land on the selling price.
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Avoid Numbers Hyphens And Other Characters
A memorable site name can go a long way towards helping your site gain traction. One quick way to make things more difficult is by adding hyphens or numbers to your domain name.
Hyphens not only make it more difficult to pass on your domain, but itll probably lead to a lot of misspellings and people not being able to find your site.
For example, whats easier to remember and type into your browser? C-N-N.com or CNN.com. Or how about Face-book.com, or Facebook.com?
The same goes for numbers. Adding numbers to your domain can come across as spammy and much more difficult to pass on.
More Ways To Find Available Domain Names
Put a free domain name search tool to work and find available website names. It’s not as easy as that. All the good ones seem to have been taken and the ones that are left might not fit your site or brand like a glove. You can try to buy it, but that might pinch.
An alternative is to brainstorm and prefix your desired name with a verb or another word. If you have time on your hands, consider tracking and buying an expired domain name you can work with.
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Now That You Know How To Check If A Domain Name Is Available Whats Next
Once you find an available domain name that will work for your business youll want to move forward with purchasing and registering the domain. There are lots of services out there that will help you purchase and register a domain name, but not all of these services are created equal.
For the best domain purchase and registration experience, youll want to use a reputable domain registrar. These services will not only sell you the domain and help you register it theyll also offer domain support and management. This will make it easier for you to ensure that your domain name stays yours and that you get the support you need if there are any issues with your domain.
What Do I Do If The Website Name I Want Is Taken
If the domain name you want is already registered, you have a few options. First, check out the recommended, similar domain names in your search results to see if one of those works. You should also consider an available domain name with an extension other than .COM, such as .IO, .CLUB, or .ROCKS. There are hundreds of new TLDs to consider. If youre really set on securing your first choice of domain, find the current registrant using Whois Lookup and see if they are willing to sell it. Learn more
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What Is A Whois Domain Lookup
A Whois domain lookup allows you to trace the ownership and tenure of a domain name. Similar to how all houses are registered with a governing authority, all domain name registries maintain a record of information about every domain name purchased through them, along with who owns it, and the date till which it has been purchased.
What Is A Whois Ip Lookup
An IP is a unique address of a server on the internet. Similar to how a telephone number allows you to connect to a specific phone on the telecom network, similarly, an IP address allows your computer to connect to a specific server on the internet.
Domain names and IP numbers are the framework upon which the entire world wide web is built.
IP numbers are assigned to networking organisations with a record maintained by governing bodies for each IP number and the organisation to which it has been assigned. A whois IP lookup allows you track the above mentioned details for a domain.
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Rules For Domain Names
When you are choosing a domain name, you should know that there are some basic rules to follow in order to proceed with the registration of free domains. The criteria concern the maximum and minimum length of the domain name and the type of characters allowed. There are also some limitations regarding special characters such as the hyphen.
Length: a domain must have a minimum of 2 characters and a maximum of 63. For .it domains the minimum length is 3 characters, while the maximum is always 63 characters.
Characters that are allowed: the domain can contain hyphens, letters from a to z and numbers from 0 to 9.
Limitations: the hyphen cannot be at the beginning or at the end of the domain name. For .eu domains the hyphen cannot be in the third and fourth position at the same time. Exceptions to this rule are domains starting with xn--, the abbreviation used for Internationalized Domain Names .
Domain Taken: What Can I Do
The name we have chosen for our project is not always among the available domains. If the domain you were thinking about is already taken, you can consider using a different extension.
In addition to the most common extensions you could use a new extension, for example .shopping, .store or .tech.
To see all the available extensions, go to the domain registration page and search for the extension that interests you. To help you find the one that suits you, we have divided them into categories .
If all extensions are taken and you still cant find available domains you can try other solutions.
First, you can use numbers or hyphens to create a unique domain name and get around the busy domain problem.
If, however, you are interested in registering the domain exactly as it is, but someone has already registered it before you then you can try to buy the domain from the person who registered it.
Some domains are bought to be then resold at a higher price. In these cases, when you visit one of these domains, it is likely that you will see a page indicating that the domain is for sale.
If not, you can still try to contact the registrant and make a purchase offer for the domain. If you want to buy a domain that has already been registered by someone else, there are marketplaces that are designed for buying and selling domains.
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Can I Use My City Name State Or Country In The Domain Name
The name of any city, state/province or country will not be vulnerable to infringement as they cannot be trademarked in most countries. A city name like London is not available for exclusive use. Such a name has universal availability and can be part of anyones domain name.
There is still a chance that a geographic term or landmark is part of a trademark. For a trademark to be considered breached, it usually would need to be more than the geographical reference which is used by someone else – for example unique words, phrases or a design/logo. Domain ownership is easily available and is only limited by a trademark breach. Checking it beforehand is highly recommended.
Locations in different languages could also be trademarked. For example, could Deutschland the German word for Germany) be trademarked in some English-speaking countries. It never hurts to double check.
Also, country-specific domain extensions, such as .de for Germany, .nl for the Netherlands or .in for India, have their own rules. Research the rules before you use a domain name with the name of a geographical place.
Effective Domain Name Search Tools And Domain Finders
Want to find an available domain name for your website? These domain search tools will help you find the right one quickly.
Have a great idea for a new website but don’t know which domain name to grab for it? First, you’ll need some web hosting to put your site on the web.
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Once your web hosting is settled, you’ll need a domain name—one that’s simple, easy to remember, and great for branding. Good domain names are also unique and descriptive. So, how do you go about landing a great domain name for your site?
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Why Do You Need To Check Domain Names For Availability
When starting a business, registering your brand name is usually the last thing on your mind. And when success arrives, it carries a slew of new issues with it. People can buy domain names that feature your brand or register your trademark first. To avoid this privacy or future lawsuit issue, register a variety of domain extensions to shield your brand from cybersquatters. If you need to develop the greatest name for your company, contact us and try the website name generator.
How Do I Find Available Domains Through The Whois Database
You can check the availability of a domain name by searching for it on the Whois database. It will give you the status of whether the domain name that you are looking for is available or not. Doing this for multiple domain names over time can help you build a list of available domain names.
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Extend Your Brand In The Url
Until 2016, Tesla Motor didnt own Tesla.com because it was already taken.
What did they do? They used TeslaMotor.com instead.
That URL served them well for years because the word motor was such a natural extension of their brand.
This method has the advantage of preserving trustworthiness in your URL.
The catch? You have to make sure you dont throw in just any old word to extend your brand. It has to be relevant and say something about your business.
Gogo, an in-flight Internet provider, uses air along with their brand name:
That makes perfect sense when you think about it.
On the other hand, if they used something like GogoToday, their brand wouldnt have been as obvious, and it wouldnt have sounded as organic.
The trick is to consider related words that you can add to your brand name without sacrificing meaning, memorability, or naturalness.
Some words lend themselves to certain niches. For example, if you sell software, you may be able to use the word app in your URL like Invision does:
This might be your best bet if youre after a .com and want to keep your brand name in the URL.
How Do I Search For Expired Domain Names
Expiring domain names are just what they sound like: Domain names that were unavailable because they were already registered but are about to expire, making the website name available for purchase again. You can search for expiring domain names using keywords or you can check the list of about-to-expire names. Search domains expiring now
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First Second And Third
Each domain name consists of several parts, separated from each other by dots. Each of these parts constitutes a level and it is considered starting from the rightmost portion of the domain name.
Lets take the domain of our customer area as an example: my.supporthost.com
Starting from the right-hand side we find com, the top-level domain. The top-level domain, also known as TLD or extension, can be chosen according to the requirements among those available.
For example, you can use a national TLD as a reference to address the audience of a specific country, as it happens for .it, .uk, .us and so on.
Then there are generic top-level domains, such as .com, one of the most widely used. And then again the new generic domains that allow you to identify a certain type of business. For example, if you decide to create an eCommerce site you might choose a new extension like .shop or .store.
The second part, after the extension, is the second-level domain. In our example, Supporthost is the second-level domain. This part of the domain name, therefore, represents the name we choose to identify our site. Typically in the case of a company, the second-level domain will then correspond to the brand.
A domain essentially needs these two components, but its structure can provide an additional level: the third level domain. This level, also known as a subdomain, is used to divide the site into categories.
Start By Typing Your Preferred Domain Name Into Your Browser
The easiest way to see if your preferred domain name is available is to try it out! In your web browser type in www.thedomainnameyouwanthere.com in the bar that shows the domain name of the webpage youre viewing. Obviously, type in the domain name youre looking for instead of thedomainnameyouwanthere.
Press enter and then see if a webpage opens. If a functioning webpage opens, then the domain name is taken. If no functioning website is attached to that domain name youll see one of two things. Youll either see an error page or youll see content on the page that offers to sell you the domain name.
Do not be fooled by the offer to purchase the domain name. That usually means that the domain name is already registered to another business or individual. It may be available for sale by that individual or business, but theyre likely to charge an exorbitant amount for the domain name.
If the webpage goes to an error page, you know the domain name is available!
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