.mil

Overview

• .mil is the sponsored top-level domain (sTLD) in the DNS reserved for the United States Department of Defense and its subsidiary or affiliated organizations.
• The name is derived from "military." It is one of the earliest top-level domains, created in January 1985.
• The registry operator is the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA); the sponsor is the DoD Network Information Center.
• DNSSEC is enabled for the zone.

History

• Introduced: January 1, 1985 (one of the first TLDs).
• Registry: Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA).
• Governance and documentation: historically governed under early Internet RFCs (e.g., RFC 920 and RFC 1591).

Usage and Audience

• Intended use: military entities of the United States Department of Defense.
• Actual use: agencies, services and divisions of the U.S. Department of Defense and related organizations.
• Organizational structure: divisions of particular services commonly use third-level and higher-level subdomains (for example, sites under army.mil).
• Note on alternate domains: the U.S. military also uses other TLDs for some purposes — e.g., recruitment and commercial-facing sites use .com, some service academies use .edu, and the Department of Defense uses .gov for its primary homepage.

Registration Rules

• Eligibility and restrictions:
  • Registration is restricted to eligible U.S. Department of Defense agencies and affiliated organizations.
  • The zone is a sponsored TLD with controlled allocation of names by DoD authorities.
• Structure:
  • Common practice is to organize sites under service-specific second-level labels with third-level hostnames for divisions and units.
• Dispute policy: None (as indicated in registry information).

SEO and Brand Impact

• .mil denotes an official U.S. military affiliation and is used to indicate authoritative, government/military resources belonging to the Department of Defense or its components.

Notable Cases or Examples

• Examples of naming and usage:
  • Service subdomains such as army.mil (United States Army) and other service-specific second-level names hosting third-level sites.
  • The Department of Defense maintains second-level labels (e.g., defense, dod, pentagon) that redirect to defense.gov.
  • Some U.S. military-related sites use other TLDs for specific purposes: goarmy.com (recruitment), commissaries.com (Defense Commissary Agency), and service academies reachable under either .edu or .mil.
  • International notes: other countries typically use second-level domains for military (e.g., mod.uk in the U.K.); Canada uses norad.mil jointly with the United States for NORAD-related services.

% IANA WHOIS server
% for more information on IANA, visit http://www.iana.org
% This query returned 1 object

domain:       MIL

organisation: DoD Network Information Center
address:      DISA-Columbus
address:      300 North James Road
address:      Whitehall OH 43213
address:      United States of America (the)

contact:      administrative
name:         DoD NIC Registry Services
organisation: DoD Network Information Center
address:      DISA-Columbus
address:      300 North James Road
address:      Whitehall OH 43213
address:      United States of America (the)
phone:        +1 614 692 6640
e-mail:       disa.columbus.ns.mbx.hostmaster-dod-nic@mail.mil

contact:      technical
name:         DoD NIC Registry Services
organisation: DoD Network Information Center
address:      DISA-Columbus
address:      300 North James Road
address:      Whitehall OH 43213
address:      United States of America (the)
phone:        +1 614 692 6640
e-mail:       disa.columbus.ns.mbx.hostmaster-dod-nic@mail.mil

nserver:      CON1.NIPR.MIL 199.252.157.234 2608:140:c:157:0:0:0:234
nserver:      CON2.NIPR.MIL 199.252.162.234 2608:120:c:162:0:0:0:234
nserver:      EUR1.NIPR.MIL 199.252.154.234 2608:4122:2:154:0:0:0:234
nserver:      EUR2.NIPR.MIL 199.252.143.234 2608:4163:1:143:0:0:0:234
nserver:      PAC1.NIPR.MIL 199.252.180.234 2608:c184:1:180:0:0:0:234
nserver:      PAC2.NIPR.MIL 199.252.155.234 2608:c144:1:155:0:0:0:234
ds-rdata:     45019 8 2 28e0bc91841d398a8d96be5115f3eb780a440a75acdf4fb6a735f60a422bd437

whois:        

status:       ACTIVE
remarks:      Registration information: 

created:      1985-01-01
changed:      2025-09-23
source:       IANA