Your domain name is the one part of your website you can’t rebuild. A new design can be built and new hosting can be bought, but yourbusiness.com is on your signs, your cards and every listing that points customers to you. If your web designer registered it for you, it may well sit in their account today. That isn’t automatically a problem. It becomes one the day you want to leave.

This is the step-by-step for how to transfer domain ownership from your web designer to your business when they’re cooperating, or at least not fighting you. It covers the two different kinds of “transfer” that people mix up, the rules ICANN sets for every accredited registrar, how long each route takes, and the step that keeps your email working through the move. If your designer has gone silent or is refusing outright, start with Held Hostage by Your Web Guy, then come back here for the mechanics.

Key takeaways
  • “Transfer” means two different things. Changing who owns the domain (the registrant) and moving it to a different company (the registrar) are separate steps, and you may need one or both.
  • If the domain is in your designer’s account at a registrar you’re happy with, an account-to-account move is usually the simplest route, and GoDaddy and Namecheap both say DNS settings carry over.
  • Unless owners can generate it themselves, ICANN requires the registrar to give the registered owner the transfer code within five calendar days of a request, and moves to a new registrar are generally blocked for 60 days after registration, a previous transfer or a change of registrant.
  • Copy every DNS record before you touch anything. Your email depends on those records as much as your website does.

First, figure out what you’re actually transferring

Three things get tangled together here. The registrant is the legal owner of record. The registrar is the company the domain is registered through. The account is the login at that registrar where someone manages and renews it. Your designer can hold the account while your business is the registrant, or hold both.

Look your domain up at lookup.icann.org, ICANN’s public registration lookup, and check the registrant details and the registrar’s name. Many registrations are privacy-protected, so you may only see the registrar. If that’s the case, ask your designer two direct questions in writing: whose name is in the registrant field, and whose account is it in? The full check is in Do You Actually Own Your Website?

What you findWhat needs to changeRoute
Registered to your business, in your designer’s accountThe accountRoute 1 or Route 2 below
Registered to your designer, in their accountThe registrant and the accountA change of registrant first, then Route 1 or Route 2
Registered to your business, in your own accountOnly who else can log inChange the password and remove your designer’s access
A screenshot of your DNS records is the backup nobody thinks to make.

Before you move anything, copy your DNS records

DNS is the set of instructions that sends your domain’s visitors to your website and its email to your inbox. The email part lives in your MX records, and if those go missing, mail sent to your business address stops arriving.

Ask your designer for a full export of the DNS zone, or log in and screenshot every record, including the A, CNAME, MX and TXT records. Note where DNS is hosted, too. It might be at the registrar, at your web host or at a service like Cloudflare. If it’s hosted somewhere other than the registrar, moving the domain normally leaves it alone, as long as the nameservers stay the same. If it’s hosted at the registrar you’re leaving, don’t assume the records will follow the domain. Have them set up at the new provider, and check that they match your notes, before the move completes.

Route 1: move it into your own account at the same registrar

If the domain is already at a registrar you’re comfortable with, you don’t have to change registrars at all. Registrars such as GoDaddy and Namecheap let one customer hand a domain to another customer’s account.

  1. Open your own account at that registrar, in your business’s name, on an email address the business controls, with 2-step verification turned on.
  2. Send your designer the details they need. At GoDaddy that’s your account email, and optionally your customer number. At Namecheap it’s your username or account email.
  3. Your designer starts the move. GoDaddy calls it transferring a domain to another GoDaddy account. Namecheap calls it a domain push, and says it’s free.
  4. Accept it promptly. GoDaddy gives the receiving account 10 days to accept before the request expires. Both GoDaddy and Namecheap say existing DNS settings stay as they are.
  5. Update the registrant details to your business if they aren’t already, and turn on auto-renew with your own payment method.

One caution on that last step. Under ICANN’s Transfer Policy, changing the registrant’s name, organization or email is a change of registrant, and the registrar must then block moves to a different registrar for 60 days, unless it offered you an opt-out and you took it beforehand. If you also plan to change registrars, ask about that opt-out before you update anything.

Route 2: move it to a new registrar

Sometimes you want the domain somewhere new entirely, alongside your new hosting or simply with a company you picked yourself. That’s a formal transfer between registrars, and ICANN sets the rules.

  1. Check that it’s eligible. Under ICANN’s rules, a transfer can be refused within 60 days of the domain’s first registration or a previous transfer, and it must be blocked for 60 days after a change of registrant unless the owner opted out. A domain on hold for payment owed on a previous registration period can also be refused.
  2. Make sure the registrant email works. Transfer codes and approval requests go to the registered owner’s email. If that address belongs to your designer, sort that out first, keeping the 60-day lock in mind.
  3. Unlock the domain and get the auth code. Many registrars let you generate it yourself. If yours doesn’t, ICANN requires the registrar to provide the code and remove the transfer lock within five calendar days of the registered owner’s request.
  4. Start the transfer at the new registrar and enter the code. Check the new registrar’s transfer price before you start. GoDaddy, for one, says you keep your remaining registration time and get another year added when you transfer in.
  5. Approve it and wait. GoDaddy says most transfers take 5 to 7 days. Under ICANN’s policy, if the old registrar doesn’t respond to the registry within five calendar days, the transfer is approved by default.
  6. Check everything once it lands. Confirm the nameservers and DNS records match your notes, load the website, send yourself a test email, turn on auto-renew and remove your designer’s access anywhere it remains.
Who paid for the domain matters less than whose name is on it.

If the domain is registered in your designer’s name

This is the harder case. When your designer is the registrant, they are the legal owner of record, and a change of registrant has to go through the current registrar. ICANN’s rules require the registrar to get confirmation from both the prior and the new registrant through a secure method, which ICANN says typically takes the form of an email. In plain terms, your designer has to start it or approve it.

If they agree, it’s routine: one request, two confirmations, then Route 1 or Route 2. If they won’t, know what each tool covers. ICANN’s compliance complaint process covers registrars that break the transfer rules, such as one that won’t release a code to the registered owner. It doesn’t force a designer who is the registrant to hand the domain over. That’s a contract question, and it may take a firm written demand or an attorney. We build and host websites, we’re not lawyers, and none of this is legal advice.

Your domain should renew on your card, in your account, under your business name. Anything less depends on someone else’s goodwill.

Put the request in writing

A two-line email beats a phone call. Name the domain, say you want it moved into an account in your business’s name, and ask for a date. If anything ever needs escalating, that email is the start of your paper trail.

Where the domain fits in a full agency switch

The domain comes first because nearly everything else hangs off it: your website, your email and the DNS records that prove to Google you own your site in Search Console. Once it’s in your account, move the hosting and site files, then the Google accounts. If your business email runs on the domain, test it the same day the transfer completes. Your Google Business Profile has its own handover process, covered in How to Transfer Ownership of Your Google Business Profile, and How to Fire Your Marketing Agency lays out the order for the whole switch.

A last note on the timing rules. ICANN’s policy community has recommended changes to these transfer locks, but as of this writing ICANN’s published Transfer Policy still carries the 60-day rules described above. Your registrar can tell you exactly what applies to your domain.

Frequently asked questions

How long does a domain transfer take?

A move between two accounts at the same registrar is done once the receiving account accepts it, and GoDaddy gives the recipient 10 days to do that. A move to a new registrar usually takes 5 to 7 days, according to GoDaddy, and ICANN’s rules approve it by default if the old registrar doesn’t respond within five calendar days.

Do I have to wait 60 days to transfer a domain?

To move it to a different registrar, sometimes. A transfer can be refused within 60 days of first registration or a previous transfer, and it must be blocked for 60 days after a change to the registrant’s name, organization or email unless the owner opted out. Moving it between accounts at the same registrar is a separate process.

How much does it cost to transfer a domain?

An account-to-account move at the same registrar is often free, and Namecheap says its push costs nothing. A move to a new registrar usually carries a fee, and some registrars add a year of registration as part of it, so check the new registrar’s price first.

Can my web designer refuse to give me my domain?

If your business is the registrant, you can go to the registrar directly. Unless you can generate the transfer code yourself, ICANN requires the registrar to provide it to the registered owner within five calendar days. If your designer is the registrant, they are the legal owner of record, and getting it back may take a written demand or an attorney.

Will my email stop working during a domain transfer?

It shouldn’t, as long as your DNS records come through intact. Copy every record before you start, confirm where DNS is hosted, and test your email the day the transfer completes.

Not sure yet what you own? Start with Do You Actually Own Your Website? And if you’re already locked out, Held Hostage by Your Web Guy picks up from there.

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