Registrant is the owner of the domain
When you purchase a domain name from a trusted domain provider, your domain registrant will always be registered in your company name or personal name, this is very important!
Many a times, your domain is registered by your marketing team, 3rd party marketing agency or your own IT team, and managed by them. What happens when they leave and they don’t hand over properly? This is where domain registrant come in handy, where you can reach out to the registrar to get help to obtain the domain ownership if any of these parties are non contactable.
Importance of buying from good domain providers
There are many providers that simply use their organisation’s information as the registrant, and that is very detrimental to your business. Run a whois on any of their client’s domain listed in the provider’s portfolio page for reference.
Checking the domain registrant
Make sure you check your domain registrant information using one of these online WHOIS tools. If your registrar supports it, enable WHOIS privacy protection to shield your personal details from public lookups.
.sg / .com.sg
https://www.sgnic.sg (Use the whois on the top right of the website)
.com / .net / .org and many more
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a domain registrant?
A domain registrant is the legal owner of a domain name. When you register a domain, your name or company name is recorded as the registrant in the global WHOIS database. This determines who has the legal right to control, transfer, or renew the domain.
What happens if my agency registered the domain under their name?
If a marketing agency or IT vendor registered the domain under their own organisation’s name, they are technically the legal owner — not you. If the relationship ends and they refuse to hand it over, recovering the domain can be difficult and may require legal action. Always ensure the registrant is set to your own name or company.
How do I check who owns a domain?
You can check domain ownership by running a WHOIS lookup. For .sg and .com.sg domains, use sgnic.sg. For .com, .net, .org and other extensions, use who.is. If WHOIS privacy is enabled, the registrant’s personal details will be masked.
