DNS Lookup
Look up every DNS record type for a domain in one go. A, AAAA, CNAME, MX, TXT, NS, SOA and CAA, with TTLs, straight from your browser.
What each record does
| Type | What it holds | Why you’d check it |
|---|---|---|
A |
An IPv4 address | Which server the domain points at |
AAAA |
An IPv6 address | The same, over IPv6 |
CNAME |
Another hostname | Aliases one name to another |
MX |
Mail servers with priorities | Where email is delivered |
TXT |
Free text | SPF, DKIM, domain verification |
NS |
The zone’s nameservers | Which provider actually controls DNS |
SOA |
Zone metadata | Serial number, negative-cache TTL |
CAA |
Permitted certificate authorities | Who may issue TLS certificates |
Start with NS
When something is wrong, check NS before anything else.
The nameservers tell you which provider is authoritative for the domain. If they don’t match the company whose control panel you’ve been editing records in, then nothing you save there is ever consulted. That single mismatch is behind most “I changed the record and nothing happened” reports.
Reading a CNAME chain
If you ask for an A record and get a CNAME back first, that’s normal. The resolver followed an alias and returned the whole chain. What matters is the address at the end of it.
One rule catches people out: you cannot put a CNAME on a root domain. The spec doesn’t allow a CNAME to sit alongside the NS and SOA records that must exist there. Some providers offer ALIAS or ANAME to work around it. Otherwise use an A record at the root and a CNAME on www.
An empty result isn’t always a problem
Most domains have no CAA record, and plenty have no AAAA. Absence is only meaningful for records you expect: no MX means mail can’t be delivered, and no NS means the domain isn’t delegated at all.
If you’re mid-migration and want to know whether a change has reached the wider internet rather than just one resolver, use the propagation checker instead — it asks several independent resolvers and compares them.