Domain Age Checker
Full URLs and subdomains are fine; the registered domain is checked. Up to 20 per run.
| Domain | Age | First online | DR |
|---|
Registration dates from each registry's RDAP server (WHOIS where there is none). First online = first capture of the homepage by the Wayback Machine. DR by Ahrefs.
Paste domains and get two ages for each: how long the current registration has run, and how long the site has been online. Plus DR, and a flag when the two ages disagree.
Why two dates: when a domain lapses and someone registers it again, the registry resets the date and the archive does not. A site "registered 2025" that was online in 2012 has changed hands.
Where the numbers come from: the registry itself over RDAP (WHOIS for endings without it) and the Wayback Machine's first capture. Nothing is estimated.
We ran a random 1,500 of the 17,918 sites MentionAgent emailed between 1 July and 25 September 2026 through this checker. 1,423 returned a registration date. Median age: 10.1 years.
New sites are common on real lists: 101 of the 1,423 (7.1%) were registered less than a year before we checked.
The oldest replied least: sites registered 20 or more years ago answered 4.8% of the time (15 of 311), against 8.9% for everything younger (99 of 1,112).
Vetting a list by hand is the slow part of outreach.
MentionAgent finds the blog posts in your niche worth appearing in, checks each site before it writes anything, finds and verifies the editor's email, writes a pitch about that specific post and handles the replies through to the live link. You approve every draft.
See how MentionAgent worksDomain age vs website age
Most domain age checkers show one date: the creation date in the registry's records. That date belongs to the current registration. If the owner lets the name expire and someone else registers it, the registry starts a new record with a new creation date, and every WHOIS-based checker will report the domain as young.
The site's history does not reset. The Wayback Machine has been capturing homepages since 1996, and its first capture of a domain is the earliest point anyone can show the site was live. So this checker reports both: age from the registration date, and first online from the archive.
| Domain age | Website age | |
|---|---|---|
| Counts from | Start of the current registration | First Wayback Machine capture of the homepage |
| Source | The registry (RDAP or WHOIS) | archive.org |
| Resets when the name lapses | Yes | No |
| Can be too young | After a re-registration | When the archive found the site late |
| Can be too old | When the name was held unused for years | Rarely |
When the two agree within a year, either one is the age. When they don't, the row gets a note saying which way they disagree.
Re-registered domains: what the flag means
A row is flagged re-registered when the site was online more than a year before its current registration began. The gap has to be real: renewals and registrar transfers do not change the creation date, so a flag means the name was released and bought again.
That matters in outreach because expired domains keep their old backlinks, and a whole trade buys them for exactly that, rebuilds a thin site on top and sells links from it. A re-registered site in your list is not proof of that. Plenty of lapsed names are picked up by someone who simply wanted the name. It is a reason to look at the site's old captures and at what it publishes now before you put your brand on it.
The opposite gap also gets a note: a name registered years before anything appeared on it was usually parked or held by an investor. That tells you less, but it explains a "15-year-old" domain with a site that looks brand new.
Domain age and outreach replies (our data)
Is an older site worth more of your time when you pitch? We took a random sample of 1,500 sites from the 17,918 MentionAgent emailed between 1 July and 25 September 2026, looked up each one's registration date with the same code this page uses, and checked whether anyone at the site answered. Out-of-office replies, bounce notices and ticket acknowledgements do not count, and only emails at least three days old are included.
| Registered | Sites | Replied | Reply rate | Median DR |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Under 1 year ago | 101 | 11 | 10.9% | 2.6 |
| 1 to 3 years | 169 | 19 | 11.2% | 23 |
| 3 to 5 years | 102 | 9 | 8.8% | 29 |
| 5 to 10 years | 335 | 24 | 7.2% | 37 |
| 10 to 15 years | 250 | 21 | 8.4% | 51 |
| 15 to 20 years | 155 | 15 | 9.7% | 50 |
| 20 years or more | 311 | 15 | 4.8% | 66 |
| All | 1,423 | 114 | 8.0% |
Two things stand out. Sites under three years old answered more often than average, about one in nine. And the oldest group, registered in 2006 or earlier, answered about half as often as everything younger. The counts per band are small, so read the middle bands as "roughly the same" rather than as a ranking.
The oldest sites are also the biggest (median DR 66), and our DR checker data shows reply rates flat across DR up to 84. So age seems to carry something DR does not. Our reading: a site that has been publishing for twenty years has a busy inbox, an editorial process and often a rate card, while a two-year-old blog is usually one person who reads their own email. Neither is a reason to skip a site. The page you would appear on still matters more than either number.
Does domain age matter for SEO?
Not as a number. Google's representatives have said for years that the age of a domain is not something its ranking systems look at. What an old domain usually has is years of links and content, and those do matter. That is why old sites tend to rank well, and why the age gets credit it does not earn on its own.
Two practical consequences. First, don't pay more for a domain or a link because the registration date is old; check what it has, starting with DR and whether the page you would be on is about your topic. Second, buying an expired domain for its age gets you nothing the registry will vouch for: the creation date resets the day you register it, as the first column here shows.
Why some domains show no date
The generic endings run by ICANN-accredited registries (.com, .net, .org, .info and newer ones like .app and .dev) publish creation dates over RDAP. Country endings vary. Some run RDAP, some only WHOIS, and some publish no creation date at all:
- .au (and .com.au): the registry does not publish a creation date, and it rate-limits lookups.
- .de: DENIC publishes no creation date.
- .co.za and a few others: no public server we can query.
In our 1,500-domain test, 95% returned a date; the misses were mostly Australian, plus a few German and South African ones. For those, the first-online date from the archive is the only age anyone can show.
Frequently asked questions
How do I check how old a domain is?
Paste the domain into the checker above. It asks the registry for the current registration date over RDAP, the registries' own lookup service, and falls back to WHOIS for endings that have no RDAP server. The age shown is the time since that date.
What is the difference between domain age and website age?
Domain age counts from the day the current owner's registration began. Website age counts from the first time the site was seen online, which we take from the Wayback Machine's first capture of the homepage. They differ when a name lapses and is registered again: the registry resets the date, the archive does not.
What does re-registered mean?
The site was online more than a year before its current registration began, so the name expired and someone bought it again. Expired names with old links are often rebuilt as link-selling sites, so a re-registered flag is a reason to look at what the site was before, not proof of anything by itself.
Why does a domain show no date?
Some registries never publish a creation date: .au and .de are the common ones. A few endings have neither RDAP nor a public WHOIS server. In our test of 1,500 domains we emailed, 95% returned a date; the misses were mostly Australian and German domains.
Does domain age affect SEO?
Not directly. Google has said repeatedly that the age of a domain is not a ranking factor. Older sites tend to rank better because they have had longer to earn links and publish, and that is what the age stands in for. A new domain with good links is not held back by its registration date.
Do older sites reply to outreach more often?
Not in our data. Across 1,423 sites MentionAgent emailed between 1 July and 25 September 2026 with a known registration date, sites registered 20 or more years ago replied 4.8% of the time (15 of 311), against 8.9% for younger sites (99 of 1,112).
Why is the first-online column slower?
Registration dates come straight from the registry in under a second. The Wayback Machine's index takes anywhere from 10 seconds to over a minute per domain and limits how fast anyone can ask, so we query it two domains at a time and keep answers for a week.