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How to transfer domains away from GoDaddy

It’s Super Bowl Sunday, a day I particularly enjoy transferring domain names out of GoDaddy, the registrar that once tempted me with low prices but now mostly just annoys me. Here’s how to move your domains to a new registrar quickly, easily and without fouling anything up (you don’t want your website to disappear!) in the process.

Aside: I happen to be transferring domains to Dreamhost, a web hosting company I’ve been using for many years that offers great pro features at good value. If you’re looking to park a bazillion domains, that’s not what they’re really for, but for hosting small- to mid-traffic sites, I totally recommend them. One thing that’s nice is that they anonymize your domain record for free, so your name and address aren’t crawled by a million spiders (many registrars like the aforementioned GoDaddy charge extra for “privacy”). If you’re transferring to a new registrar that’s not Dreamhost, don’t worry, these are generic directions and all about how to transfer away from GoDaddy.

1. Make sure your domain is at least 90 days old

GoDaddy fabulously won’t let you transfer a domain name you just registered. (OK, there are some ICANN regulations at work, too.) Of course, if you’re about saving money, you’ll probably wait until your domain is close to expiring before you transfer it — you’ve already paid your year’s rent.

2. Change your GoDaddy settings and get your auth code

In the GoDaddy Domain Manager, find the domain you want to transfer and click it’s lock icon to unlock it (if it’s already unlocked, you can just click on the domain name to manage the domain). Here’s what I’m talking about (click the screenshot to see it full size):

Now you should be in the domain’s detail screen:

1. Make sure that “Privacy” and “Domain Ownership Protection” are Off and that the domain is unlocked (if you just did this, it will still show up as “Locked” as in the screenshot, but don’t worry, if you just unlocked it, then it’s unlocked).
2. Make sure your email address is correct in the administrative contact, because GoDaddy will be emailing your transfer authorization code (Email!?!?! What is this, 1995? @%&*$#@ GoDaddy!)
3. DNS settings: Chances are, you’re using GoDaddy’s free DNS service, as shown in the screenshot (ns23.domaincontrol.com means GoDaddy). If you’re already using your own or some other 3rd party DNS servers, you don’t need to do anything and can skip to step 4.

   The important thing to know here is that this setting is part of your domain record, and will transfer over to the new registrar (i.e, it won’t automagically switch to your new registrar’s DNS servers, because there’s nothing about being a domain host that says you also provide DNS), so if you are using GoDaddy’s servers you need to change these now, before you transfer the domain! If you’re using GoDaddy’s DNS and you transfer the domain with the record still pointing to ns.domaincontrol.com, then your site will go dark because ns.domaincontrol.com will start telling folks it’s never heard of your domain.

   So, if you’re using GoDaddy’s free DNS service, here’s what you need to do:

   • Easy: If you’ve just got a parked domain or you’re only using the domain name for a website — you only care about example.com and www.example.com (and you’re not using subdomains like mail.example.com for your email) — just change these to your new registrar or DNS host’s nameservers. For Dreamhost, these are ns1.dreamhost.com and ns2.dreamhost.com.
   • Hard: If you do have special DNS records (like mail.example.com or ones you’ve manually created), you need to load these into your new registrar/DNS host before you change the nameservers. Unfortunately, some big registrars like Network Solutions have crappy systems and won’t let you start setting DNS records on a domain until after you’ve transferred the domain — so if you’re in a situation like this you can either half-ass it and just live with a few hours of downtime while you scurry to reinput your DNS records, or you can use a “real” DNS host like UltraDNS or run your own DNS (which you could just do temporarily — just for a few days and then change nameservers to your new registrar’s free DNS once you’re registered with them). Anyway, once you’ve got your special DNS records set up with your new nameservers (or have decided to half-ass it), follow the directions above in “Easy” to update your domain record with the new nameservers.
4. Click “Send by Email” and GoDaddy will email you the transfer authorization code you need to give to your new registrar

3. Transfer the name into your new registrar

Your new domain name registrar’s website will walk you through this. You’ll need to give them the auth code that GoDaddy just sent you.

Once your new registrar has verified the auth code with GoDaddy, it may ask you to confirm the transfer. Dreamhost usually does the verification in a few seconds, then sends you an email with a link you have to click to confirm.

4. Wait (Or, go back to GoDaddy Domain Manager and confirm)

You’re done! After you complete the previous step, GoDaddy will send you an email written by someone barely proficient in English to say that the domain transfer is approved and the domain will automatically transfer over in 5 days.

So, you really don’t have to do anything more at this point, I promise. But if you’re totally OCD, you can go back to GoDaddy’s Domain Manager, select Pending Transfers, check the checkbox next to your name(s) and use the Accept/Decline button to Accept the transfer. Naturally, GoDaddy has intentionally worded this to confuse you, so on the confirmation screen I think you actually have to select “Cancel” as in “Cancel this domain from my GoDaddy account” to “Accept” the transfer. So, just don’t get caught by their trap and accidentally cancel the transfer, or you’ll really feel like an idiot.