• The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) ratified the specifications for the Registration Data Access Protocol (RDAP) a decade ago, in March 2015, with the clear intent of replacing the ageing whois protocol. • While whois remains in widespread use, the RDAP ecosystem is rapidly maturing. • Indeed, 2025 saw significant adoption and an accelerated expansion of RDAP services across the industry. • The sunset is complete: A new baseline The most critical context for the growth occurring last year was the sunset of whois, which officially occurred on 28 January 2025. • On this date, the contractual obligation for most Generic Top-Level Domain (gTLD) registry operators, and all gTLD registrars, to provide a whois service was removed. • With the requirement removed, many registries and registrars began shutting down their whois services.
Article Summaries:
- The IETF’s RDAP, ratified in 2015, has rapidly overtaken the legacy whois protocol after whois was sunset on 28 January 2025. Within months, 74 gTLD registries shut their whois services, and by September 374 had ceased offering whois. Monthly whois queries fell 60 % from 122 billion to 49 billion, while RDAP queries surged from 7 billion to 65 billion, surpassing whois in June 2025. CC‑TLDs, though not mandated, now support RDAP at roughly 60 % of sites, a 12 % rise. The ecosystem is bolstered by growing client and server software, and new RDAP extensions are being standardized.
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