The whois command provides information on Internet DNS registrations for organizations. This can be useful for learning or verifying information regarding ownership of a domain name, contact information for an organization, etc.
Some examples include:
# whois google.com # whois ubuntu.com
If you encounter the below error while running the whois command:
whois: command not found
you may try installing the below package as per your choice of distribution:
| Distribution | Command |
|---|---|
| OS X | brew install whois |
| Debian | apt-get install whois |
| Ubuntu | apt-get install whois |
| Alpine | apk add whois |
| Arch Linux | pacman -S whois |
| Kali Linux | apt-get install whois |
| CentOS | yum install whois |
| Fedora | dnf install whois |
| Raspbian | apt-get install whois |
Syntax
The syntax of the whois command is:
# whois [options] {domain name}
whois Command Examples
1. Get information about a domain name:
# whois example.com
2. Get information about an IP address:
# whois 8.8.8.8
3. Get abuse contact for an IP address:
# whois -b 8.8.8.8