DNS lookup
Every record for a domain, resolved through public nameservers.
Free and no signup. This one fetches the URL from our server; nothing about it is stored.
Queried through Cloudflare and Google rather than our own resolver, so the answer is what the internet sees rather than what one machine has cached.
About this tool
The reason to use a lookup tool rather than your own machine is caching. Your resolver may be holding an answer from before your last change, and a VPN or corporate network may be answering differently again. This asks Cloudflare and Google directly, so the answer is what the internet sees rather than what one machine remembers.
- Records are queried through 1.1.1.1 and 8.8.8.8. A local resolver can hold a stale answer for as long as the previous TTL, which is exactly the window in which people go looking for a DNS tool.
- A missing AAAA record means the domain is IPv4-only. Not a fault, and increasingly worth fixing as mobile networks move to IPv6-first.
- TXT records hold SPF, domain verification and a lot of history. They are worth reading through occasionally for entries nobody remembers adding.
- DNS changes propagate at the speed of the old TTL, not instantly. A record that looks wrong minutes after a change is usually a cache, not a mistake.
Questions
- Why does my DNS change not show up?
- Resolvers cache for the record’s previous TTL. If it was an hour, an hour is how long the old answer can persist — lowering the TTL before a planned change is the way to avoid that.
- What is the difference between A and CNAME?
- An A record points a name at an IP address. A CNAME points a name at another name. You cannot have a CNAME at the apex of a domain alongside other records, which is why apex CNAMEs are a recurring source of trouble.
- Do I need an AAAA record?
- Not strictly, but IPv6-only clients exist and are growing. Adding one costs nothing if your host supports it.