How to find out where a domain's DNS is hosted

Introduction

In this article, we cover how to determine where the DNS for a domain is hosted. This will be the location where changes need to made if changes are needed.

Procedure

1) Dig the top-level domain at the root nameserver to find the top-level domain nameserver. For example.com you would use the following command.

~ dig +short SOA com
a.gtld-servers.net. nstld.verisign-grs.com. 1597810091 1800 900 604800 86400

2) Dig the domain at the nameserver returned in the previous command. For example.com you would use the following command. The nameservers used by the domain will be located in the authority section.

~ dig NS example.com @a.gtld-servers.net.
...
;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
example.com. 172800 IN NS a.iana-servers.net.
example.com. 172800 IN NS b.iana-servers.net.
...