Domain Expiry & WHOIS Monitor

Tracks domain registration status via raw WHOIS lookups -- no browser, no proxy. Point it at one or more domains and get back the registrar, creation date, expiry date, days remaining, nameservers, and domain status codes -- plus a letter grade, a 0-100 score, a severity tag, and a plain-English summary so an expiring or lapsed domain never gets buried in a wall of fields.

What you get, per domain

• A letter grade (A+ to F) and 0-100 score summarizing registration health at a glance
• A one-line executive summary ("Domain expires in 12 day(s) -- renew soon.")
• A severity tag -- critical (expired, expiring within your warning window, unregistered, or the lookup itself failed), warning (registered but missing a data field), or ok -- for instant triage
• Registrar and creation date
• Expiry date and days until expiry
• isExpired / isExpiringSoon flags (soon = within your configurable warning window, default 30 days)
• Domain status codes (e.g. clientTransferProhibited) and nameservers
• A plain-English issues list when something looks off (no expiry field exposed, lookup failed, domain unregistered, etc.)
• Domains are checked in parallel (configurable), with per-TLD WHOIS referral lookups automatically cached and shared across domains -- so a watchlist of 50 .com domains queries IANA once, not 50 times

Why this instead of checking manually

	Manual registrar logins	Domain Expiry & WHOIS Monitor
Coverage	One registrar dashboard at a time	Every domain you list, across any registrar, automatically
Speed	Login, click through, repeat per domain	Seconds, via parallel WHOIS lookups
Triage	You scan dates yourself	Pre-classified severity + letter grade
Repeatability	Forgotten until a renewal email (or missed)	One click, or schedule it
Output	Screenshots or a spreadsheet you update by hand	Structured dataset, exportable to CSV/JSON/BI tools

Who this is for

• Agencies and freelancers managing domains for multiple clients who want a single expiry dashboard instead of checking each registrar
• Anyone who's ever lost a domain to an expired registration
• IT/ops teams tracking a portfolio of company domains
• Domain investors monitoring watchlists for drops

How to use it

1. Add one or more domains to check (no protocol, e.g. example.com).
2. Optionally adjust the expiry warning threshold (days) and concurrency.
3. Run it once for a snapshot, or put it on an Apify Schedule (e.g. weekly) so you get an updated dataset before anything lapses.

How it works

This Actor speaks the WHOIS protocol directly over a raw TCP socket (port 43) -- the same protocol whois command-line tools use. It first asks IANA's root WHOIS server which registry is authoritative for the domain's TLD (caching that answer per TLD so it's only asked once per batch), then queries that registry directly. No headless browser, no proxy, no third-party API keys required.

Example output (one item)

{
  "domain": "example.com",
  "score": 100,
  "grade": "A+",
  "severity": "ok",
  "summary": "No issues found -- domain registration looks healthy.",
  "found": true,
  "registrar": "RESERVED-Internet Assigned Numbers Authority",
  "creationDate": "1995-08-14T04:00:00Z",
  "expiryDate": "2026-08-13T04:00:00Z",
  "daysUntilExpiry": 45,
  "isExpired": false,
  "isExpiringSoon": false,
  "status": ["clientDeleteProhibited", "clientTransferProhibited"],
  "nameServers": ["A.IANA-SERVERS.NET", "B.IANA-SERVERS.NET"],
  "whoisServer": "whois.verisign-grs.com",
  "issueCount": 0,
  "issues": [],
  "checkedAt": "2026-08-22T00:00:00.000Z"
}

Pricing

This Actor uses pay-per-event pricing:

• Domain checked -- charged once per domain processed.

Parallel checking doesn't cost more -- it just finishes faster.

FAQ

Does this work for every TLD? It covers gTLDs and most ccTLDs that expose a public WHOIS service and a standard IANA referral (the vast majority of domains). A small number of ccTLD registries use web-based lookups instead of WHOIS-on-port-43, or redact expiry dates for privacy -- for those, found may be true but expiryDate will be null, and the issue list will explain why.

What makes something "critical" vs. a "warning"? critical covers the scenarios that actually threaten the domain: expired, expiring within your warning window, unregistered, or the WHOIS lookup itself failing. warning covers a registered domain with an incomplete WHOIS response (e.g. no registrar field) -- worth a look, but not urgent.

Will higher concurrency get me rate-limited by WHOIS servers? It's possible -- some registries are stricter about concurrent connections than typical web servers. That's why the default concurrency here (3) is more conservative than in our HTTP-based Actors, and why per-TLD IANA lookups are cached rather than repeated. Raise it gradually and watch for WHOIS lookup failed issues if you push it higher.

Does this send data anywhere besides your own Apify account? No. It only queries public WHOIS servers for the domains you provide.

Can I use this to bulk-check whether domains are available to register? It will tell you if a domain has no matching WHOIS record, but availability checking has TLD-specific edge cases -- always confirm with your registrar before assuming a domain is free.