---
title: Domain name
description: Define your online identity. This page explains what a domain name is, its structure, and related information.
---
A **Domain Name** is a human-readable identification string used to locate resources on the Internet. It maps complex numerical IP addresses to memorable names.

## The Structure of a Domain Name

A domain name is read hierarchically from right to left:

1.  **Top-Level Domain (TLD)**: The suffix (e.g., `.com`, `.fr`).
2.  **Second-Level Domain (SLD)**: The unique name chosen by the registrant (e.g., `example`).
3.  **Subdomain**: prefixes for specific services (e.g., `www`, `api`).

A **Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN)** includes all labels up to the root (e.g., `www.example.com.`).

## The EPP Statuses

The Extensible Provisioning Protocol (EPP) assigns status codes to domains to indicate their state or restrictions. These are visible in WHOIS/RDAP lookups.

### Server Statuses (Set by Registry)

The registry can apply EPP codes to modify the state of a domain name. These are all codes except those beginning with `client`, which are reserved for registrars.
Generic codes are listed in the ICANN documentation.

Some registries have developed additional codes to describe non-standard cases.
For example, AFNIC added the code `server trade prohibited` to describe the prohibition of the `trade` operation on a domain name.
This operation is part of AFNIC's EPP extension and is not a standard operation for a domain name.

### Client Statuses (Set by Registrar)

Registrars can also apply EPP codes to a domain name. These codes always begin with `client` to distinguish them from the codes applied by the registry.

Some codes have the same effect as those applied by the registry.

For example, the `client hold` and `server hold` codes block the resolution of a domain name's DNS zone.
This means that the top-level domain name's DNS zone no longer contains the `NS` records necessary for delegating the domain name's zone.
This results in the complete shutdown of services for the domain name.
This code is often used by the registrar to strongly encourage the registrant to pay renewal fees (when the domain name is not in its redemption period).

## Internationalized Domain Name (IDN)

An IDN is a domain name that contains characters other than the standard ASCII format (a-z, 0-9, and hyphens). This includes characters with diacritics (accents) or characters from non-Latin scripts (Arabic, Chinese, Cyrillic, etc.).

To function in the legacy DNS system, IDNs are converted into an ASCII-compatible format called **Punycode**, which always begins with `xn--`.

|      Display      |         Punycode         |
|:-----------------:|:------------------------:|
| `maëlgangloff.fr` | `xn--malgangloff-0bb.fr` |

## See also

  - [EPP Status Codes](https://icann.org/epp) on the ICANN website
