Free tool
Domain drop date checker
A domain drops when its registry deletes it after expiry and it becomes available to register again. Type a domain that has expired, or that you are waiting on: this reads its status from the registry right now — grace period, redemption or pending delete — and works out when it will be released.
Updated · reads the registry live over RDAP
How the estimate is worked out
An expired .com, .net, .org or other gTLD does not drop on its expiry date. It moves through stages that ICANN policy fixes in length, except for the first, and the registry publishes which stage a domain is in as a status code. That status is the whole basis of the estimate, which is why this tool reads it live from the registry rather than from a WHOIS copy.
| Status the registry shows | What it means | What this tool reports |
|---|---|---|
| Active, expiry in the future | Paid up | Not dropping. If it is not renewed: earliest drop 36 days after expiry, latest 81 |
autoRenewPeriod, or past expiry with no other status | Expired, registrar has not deleted it yet — up to 45 days | A window: earliest 36 days from today, latest 81 days after expiry |
redemptionPeriod | Deleted by the registrar, restorable by the old owner for 30 days | An estimated drop date 36 days after the stage began, and the last day it can still be restored |
pendingDelete | Unrecoverable, released on the 6th day | An estimated drop date 6 days after the stage began |
| No record | Never registered, or already dropped | Not registered — it can be registered now |
The full sequence, and what can still be done at each stage, is in what happens when a domain expires.
Why it is an estimate, and how far to trust it
Two of the inputs are firm and one is not. Redemption is 30 days and pending delete is 5, by policy. The auto-renew grace period before them is anywhere from 0 to 45 days, and the registrar decides — so until a domain reaches redemption, nobody outside the registrar can tell you the date, and this tool shows the window instead of pretending.
Once a domain is in redemption, the date that matters is when redemption began. RDAP does not publish it as such. The closest signal is the record's last changed date, because the registrar's delete is the change that moved the domain into redemption. The tool uses it only when it falls inside the 30 days it would have to mark; otherwise it shows the full window.
The same field marks the start of pending delete, and we checked how long that stage really lasts at Verisign. On 20 October 2026 we read 37 .com records: every name released on 19 October had last changed on 13 October, and every name due on 20 October had last changed on 14 October. Of the 14 we followed from the first group, 9 were already deleted and 5 had been registered again by someone else, all on 19 October. So a .com in pending delete is released on the sixth calendar day after the stage begins, one day later than the "five days" in the policy text, and the tool estimates from that. If the last-changed date is too old to be the start of the stage, it falls back to the window.
Your lookup does not touch our servers. The request goes from your browser straight to the registry for that extension. We never see which domain you checked — which matters more than usual on a page people use to watch names they want.
Country-code domains run on different clocks
The ICANN timeline binds gTLDs only. Country-code registries set their own rules: Nominet's .uk path, for example, suspends a domain 30 days after expiry and cancels it around day 90, with no redemption stage in the ICANN sense. For a two-letter extension this tool reports the stage the registry shows and does not invent a date. Whether a registry publishes RDAP at all is listed in RDAP support by TLD.
Available is not the same as obtainable
On drop day the registry releases names in a batch, and backorder services fire registration attempts within milliseconds of it. For a short, aged or well-linked name, typing it into a registrar afterwards will lose. For the far more common case — a long descriptive name a business simply stopped paying for — nobody is competing, and anyone watching can register it at the ordinary price. How a domain drop actually works covers which is which, and redemption vs pending delete covers the last two stages in detail.
A date checked once goes stale
The estimate is only as current as the moment you pressed the button. The old owner can restore a domain on day 29 of redemption, and a registrar can delete one early in its grace period. DropPerch re-reads the registry daily and emails you once when a watched domain changes state — into redemption, into pending delete, or released — which is the signal a drop date only predicts.
Common questions
How long after a domain expires does it drop?
For a gTLD such as .com, between about 36 and 81 days. Up to 45 days of auto-renew grace, which the registrar decides, then 30 days of redemption and 5 days of pending delete, which are fixed; at Verisign the name is released on the sixth day of pending delete. Country-code domains follow their own registry rules.
How accurate is the drop date?
For a domain in redemption or pending delete, the start of the stage is read from the record's last-changed date, which we checked against 37 .com records at Verisign. Treat the date as close rather than guaranteed: the old owner can still restore a name in redemption. Before redemption the date depends on the registrar, so the tool shows a window.
Can I register a domain that is in redemption?
No. During the 30-day redemption period only the previous owner can restore it, through their registrar and for a fee. It becomes registrable by anyone only after it passes through pending delete and drops.
What time of day do domains drop?
Each registry releases deleted names in its own daily batch, so the day is predictable from the status and the exact minute is not published in RDAP. For contested names the backorder services are faster than any person watching the clock.
Is this drop date checker free?
Yes, with no signup and no limit. The lookup runs in your browser and asks the registry directly, so it costs us nothing to serve.
Can I get an alert when the domain drops?
This page checks once. DropPerch watches a list of domains daily and emails you when one enters redemption, enters pending delete, or is released — no card, 25 domains free for the first 25 accounts, 5 after.
One lookup tells you today. Monitoring tells you in time.
DropPerch re-reads the registry for every domain you watch, every day, and emails you before it expires. Any registrar, no transfer, no card: 25 domains free for the first 25 accounts, 5 after.