For a step-by-step tutorial on transferring your domain name to Gandi, please refer to our transfer guide. →

See Transferring your .CO.UK, .ORG.UK and .ME.UK to Gandi →

You can transfer any domain name to Gandi only if its TLD (ex: .com, .fr, .net, etc) is managed by our services.

To find out which TLDs are handled by Gandi, please consult our price list page.

If we don't support your TLD yet, vote for it on the wishlist!

When you change your registrar, you change your contract; you may find more information on this topic by consulting our contract.

The transfer will add one full year (12 months) to the current expiration date, you keep all the pro rata. This rule applies to every accredited registrar.

The transfer will add one year to the transfer date, so you will lose the surplus from the previous expiration date. This rule applies to every accredited registrar, because when the registry DNS.be makes the transfer, it resets the creation date (transfer date = new creation date).

See:

• eu
• Transferring a .BE domain name to Gandi
• External links

Each registrar uses its own handles to identify the contacts of a domain. During the transfer these handles will be changed. That means that the contacts can very well be different people after the transfer; in that case, the former contacts will no longer have authority over the domain.

A transfer in itself will not lead to a change in DNS. Your current services (website, e-mails, etc) should work as usual during the entire transfer process. However if your DNS were provided by the losing registrar, the DNS services may be cut after the transfer. If you have any doubt concerning your DNS, please contact your DNS provider.

With certain extensions, you may request that both the registrar and owner be changed simultaneously.

In cases where this is not possible, you must make a change of ownership before or after the domain is transferred to Gandi.

See Domain name trades →

See Summary of domain name transfers to Gandi for a summary of how transfers affect expiration dates for each extension.

You can view our complete transfer rates here.

In addition, if the transfer should fail for any reason, it is possible to restart the process without any additional fees; a process that may be done as many times as necessary in the Manage tab, and then in your Orders in Progress page.

Your transfer will take about 1 to 10 days, depending on how quickly your current registrar deals with the authorization request emails and how long the domain contacts take to respond to them.

It is always the receiving registrar (the destination registrar) who is in charge of the procedure and deals with letters of authorization, billing, etc.

To transfer a domain to Gandi, please follow the procedure outlined on our “Transfer” page. If you want to transfer your domain from Gandi to another registrar, please, contact your new registrar.

You were not able to begin your transfer, you encountered an error.

If the Whois information on the domain is not available : Please contact your registrar. Our system needs the Whois for finding which e-mail addresses the transfer request must be sent to. Once the Whois information becomes available, you may make an online transfer request.

Ìf the current Whois data presents the correct e-mail addresses of the contacts : Please contact us (see the link below). Your registrar might not use one of the standard formats, or perhaps they recently changed how it appears in their Whois output. In that case, our system cannot detect it automatically, though we can take care of it manually if is brought to our attention.

The transfer failed because your domain name has expired. What now?

You should renew your domain name with the current registrar. Then wait 46 days before requesting another transfer.

The 46-day delay guaranties that the combined years of the renewal and the transfer will be added together. Sometimes the auto-renewal system of the registries can cancel one of those years, as explained in the ICANN Advisory, dated June 6th 2002.

If necessary, you may restart the transfer process without any additional fees; a process that may be done as many times as necessary, with no time limit, and without any limit on the number of attempts that may be made. This may be done at Administration - Orders in Progress.

We strongly advise not waiting until the deletion of the domain name. There is no sure way to know the exact deletion moment, and you can not be sure that you will be the first one to re-register this domain (the “first-come, first served” rule applies). Moreover, if you choose to wait for the domain name to be deleted, you could lose the transfer payment: we do not refund failed transfers when the failure is not due to Gandi.

Please keep in mind that you can check the expiration dates of your domain name(s), at any time, in the Whois database. We advise you to start your next transfers at least one month before the expiration date. By doing so, you will hopefully get enough time to restart the transfer if it failed at the first attempt.

The reason can be one of the following:

• The domain is less than 60 days old
• The domain is blocked (status LOCK or HOLD) for a specific reason: pending dispute, lack of payment, etc
• The domain is protected against transfers by default.

Many registrars set a LOCK status, or another type of security measure on every domain by default. In this case, they must provide you with an online tool that can be used to easily UNLOCK the domain.

In all such instances, you should contact your current registrar. They must inform you of the exact reasons for their refusal. Gandi can not get this information for you, since we are not privy to this information.

Once the issue is settled, you will be able to restart your transfer request for free with Gandi.

Your transfer has failed because it was denied by the registrar Joker.

At Joker, all the domains are locked against tranfers by default.

You need to ask Joker to unlock your domain. The transfer will be possible for a short period of time. This time frame is called a window. This window opens 5 days after you have requested your domain to be unlocked, and stays open for 10 days thereafter.

We advise you to wait one day between when you ask Joker to unlock your domain, and your new transfer attempt with Gandi.

Your transfer failed because the holder (owner of the domain or his/her representative: administrative contact) has not replied within the time limit, or has refused the transfer.

Reminder : Gandi's transfer request is sent by email to the owner and the administrative contact of the domain. You can check their emails in the Whois database.

We advise you to check the following points. Then you can restart your transfer request for free.

Are you sure that the holder agrees with a transfer process?

• maybe he/she has refused the transfer just because he/she was not sure what to do
• maybe he/she does not open often his/her mailbox
• if you are the domain owner, and if the administrative contact still refuses the transfer, you can replace this contact by another person. This change must be requested from the current registrar. After this change, please wait for the Whois update before restarting your transfer request.

Can the holder be contacted by email?

If the e-mail addresses in the current Whois are not valid, you need to update this data. Request this modification from your current Registrar, and check the new Whois. Then you can then restart your transfer.

Did the holder have problems accepting the transfer?

Our transfer system is all automated, thus we need to receive an answer with a specific syntax. To accept the transfer, you must only reply with the accept code in the main message, including the square brackets.

Warning : if you quote the whole original message, our system will find several codes, thus your authorization will fail.

The transfer failed because the registry did not accept the authorization key that you provided.

You can restart the transfer for free.

To avoid a repeat failure, you should contact your current registrar. They must provide you with the correct code in order to transfer this domain.

Unfortunately Gandi does not have access to this code, and has no way to validate another code. If you cannot get this from your current registrar, you may consider lodging a complaint with ICANN.

In order to avoid misuse, we do not refund transfers that have failed for a reason that cannot be attributed to Gandi(no reply or refusal from any of the contacts, refusal from the current registrar, several paid and started transfers instead of restarting the same one, etc.). If you do not know exactly what to do, please, feel free to contact us before paying for your transfer.

If necessary, you may restart the transfer process without any additional fees; a process that may be done as many times as necessary on the “Manage” tab and then on your Orders in Progress page.

If necessary, you may restart the transfer process without any additional fees (except .fr domains); a process that may be done as many times as necessary at Manage - Orders in Progress. If the occasion should arise, you can also change the authorization key on the same page.

You may relaunch transfers of .fr domains for free up to 7 weeks after your initial payment.

See also Relaunching your domain name transfer →

Your transfer order has been rejected because your domain is currently in “LOCK” status (or equivalent).

A registrar can set a domain status to “LOCK” for several reasons: dispute in progress, expired domain, etc. Some registrars set a “LOCK” status by default on all domains registered with them. This practice is in total accordance with ICANN transfer regulations if the registrar offers its customers an easy way to remove the lock via its web interface.

You will therefore need to contact your current registrar. We have provided some helpful instructions on this here.

You may have noticed the mention of this delay in our contract.

This is the minimum period of time required between the original registration date (new domain name), and the time by which transfers are allowed (change of registrar). This delay applies to all registrars.

For some TLDs, during this 60-day period, the status of your domain shows: TRANSFER PROHIBITED.

Usually this restriction does not cause any inconvenience : you can change your domain parameters as soon as it is created. Particularly you can move the DNS management to the hosting provider of your choice.

Note that domains more than 60 days old are not concerned with this issue. You can see the initial date of creation in Gandi's whois, after the mention :

reg_created:...

There is no contractual delay between two transfers, but it is recommended to wait 45 days. Indeed, if not enough time has passed between two transfers, the registry may cancel a renewal (for details please see the ICANN advisory).

What is this code?

For .COM .NET .BIZ .INFO .NAME and .ORG domain names, you will need an authorization key.

You will find it through your current registrar. Unfortunately Gandi does not have access to this key, and has no way to deliver another key. If you are not able to get it from the current registrar, you may consider filing a complaint with ICANN.

We have provided some helpful instructions on this here.

You will need to see with the gaining registrar with regards to their transfer procedure. For the most popular extensions, all that you need to to at Gandi is to obtain your authorization code, and be sure that your domain is not locked against transfer.

• How to get your authorization code
• Removing the transfer protection from your domain

After a domain name is transferred away from Gandi, and to your new registrar, you will still see the domain in your list of domains for one week. This is simply because you can continue to use our DNS during this period, however it does not mean that you can manage your domain via our interface: that can only be done at your new registrar.

If your domain is less than 60 days old, it cannot yet be transferred. This is an ICANN rule, which applies to all registrars

Technically, you do not need to transfer your domain to your web host to use their hosting services

You have various options, two of them are :

• Either you link your host's DNS to your domain by Gandi :

DNS update time : about 3 days

• Or you use URL forwarding by Gandi:

update time : 2 hours

All our customers can leave us at their own convenience (before the expiration date) and without any additional cost.

• The domain is less than 60 days old; after this period has ended, ask your future registrar to restart the transfer request.
• The domain has expired: you need to renew the domain at Gandi.
  • After the renewal, please wait 46 days, and then restart your transfer at the gaining registrar. The 46-day delay is called the AutoRenewPeriod, and ensures that the one-year renewal and the one-year transfer will add up. This delay only applies to late renewals (renewal made after the expiration date). For more on this, please see the ICANN Advisory dated 6 June 2002).
• The domain is protected against transfers: status LOCK or Transfer Prohibited is displayed in the Whois. As the owner or administrative contact you can remove transfer protection.
• The domain is blocked but not expired or protected: please contact us through the link below.

See also: List of errors during a domain name transfer →