DNS Lookup Tool
Use this tool to perform DNS lookups across all major record types. Great for help desk agents and network engineers troubleshooting domain issues.
This DNS Lookup Tool runs a “full check” across the record types that cause most real-world outages: A/AAAA (web/app resolution), CNAME (aliases), MX + TXT (email routing and SPF/DKIM), and NS/SOA (authoritative DNS health). If you’re troubleshooting “site won’t load,” “email bounced,” or “it works for me but not for them,” start here.
Use it to confirm what the public DNS actually returns right now. If records look correct but users still fail, you may be dealing with caching, split-horizon/internal DNS, resolver filtering, or a stale record on an intermediate resolver.
How to interpret results
If A/AAAA records point to the wrong IP, users may reach an old server, a decommissioned load balancer, or the wrong region. For CNAME, verify the target exists and ultimately resolves to a valid A/AAAA record. For email, start with MX and then validate TXT for SPF/DKIM/DMARC—missing or malformed TXT is a common cause of deliverability and rejection issues.
When not to trust a single lookup: DNS is cached. A record change can appear “fixed” on one resolver and “broken” on another until TTLs expire. Also, some environments use split DNS (internal vs external answers), so public results may differ from corporate/VPN results.
Next steps: if DNS looks correct but the service is still unreachable, validate network reachability with Ping Monitor, confirm the path with Traceroute Map, and check service ports with Port Scanner.
What is DNS?
DNS (Domain Name System) translates domain names (like google.com) into IP
addresses. It's often described as the "phone book of the internet."
Record Types Explained
- A – Maps domain to IPv4 address
- AAAA – Maps domain to IPv6 address
- CNAME – Alias of another domain
- MX – Mail server for the domain
- NS – Name servers for the domain
- SOA – Start of Authority: primary name server & zone info
- TXT – Text data like SPF, DKIM, etc.
- PTR – Reverse lookup for IPs
Common Help Desk Use Cases
- Check if a domain resolves to the correct IP (A/AAAA)
- Verify email configuration (MX + TXT)
- Check DNS propagation issues across records
- Perform reverse lookups on IPs (PTR)