The 60-day lock after registration or transfer – what does it mean?

For most generic extensions (.com, .net, .org, etc.), a standard industry-wide rule (ICANN policy) forbids transferring a domain to another registrar for 60 days after:

• the domain's initial registration;
• a previous transfer to another registrar;
• a change to the holder's contact details (name, organization, or email).

The purpose of this rule is to reduce the risk of domain theft — if someone managed to gain unauthorized control of a domain, the 60-day lock limits their ability to quickly move it to another registrar, out of the real owner's reach, giving time for the situation to be detected and corrected.

A few useful notes:

• the lock is mandatory and cannot be disabled for new registrations or recent transfers;
• the lock triggered only by a contact-details change can, in some cases, be optionally disabled on request;
• turning WHOIS privacy protection on or off does not trigger this lock;
• for .ro domains, RoTLD applies its own transfer rules, which can differ from ICANN's policy for generic extensions.

If you try to transfer a domain and get an error related to a lock period, check the date of the last registration, transfer, or contact-details change — most likely you just need to wait until the 60 days are up.