Who Really Owns Your Website? Domains, Hosting, Logins & Code Explained

Ask most business owners who owns their website and they’ll say, “I do. I paid for it.” That’s a fair assumption, and sometimes it’s even true. But a website isn’t one thing. It’s a handful of separate pieces, and each one can be registered, billed or legally owned by someone different.

Here’s a plain breakdown of what those pieces are, who should own each one, and how to check today.

The five pieces of a website

1. The domain name

This is your address, like yourbusiness.com. You don’t buy a domain forever. You register it through a registrar and renew it on a schedule. Whoever is listed as the registrant controls it.

Who should own it: Your business, every time. Your designer can manage it for you, but the registrant record should show your business name and an email address you control.

2. The hosting

Hosting is the server where your site’s files and database live. It’s rented space, usually billed monthly or yearly.

Who should own it: This one varies. Some agencies host client sites on their own servers as part of a care plan, which is fine as long as you can get a full copy of your site whenever you ask. If you hold the hosting account yourself, give your developer their own login rather than sharing yours.

3. The content

Your words, photos, logo, videos and product information. If you wrote it or paid someone to shoot it, you’ll want clear rights to keep using it no matter who maintains the site.

Watch out for stock photos and fonts. Some are licensed to the designer for a specific project, not to you. Ask for a list of anything licensed.

4. The design and code

This is the part people rarely think about. The layout, the custom features and the underlying code are creative work, and the law treats them that way.

Under U.S. copyright law, hiring an outside contractor doesn’t automatically make you the owner of what they create. In most cases ownership has to be spelled out in a signed written agreement. The U.S. Copyright Office’s guide on works made for hire explains the rules. If ownership matters to you (and it should), get it in writing, and have an attorney review anything you’re unsure about.

At Axiom, when we do a fully custom build, the client owns 100% of the code. That’s the standard you should ask any developer about.

5. The accounts around the site

These aren’t the website itself, but they’re tied to it and they matter just as much:

• Google Analytics
• Google Search Console
• Google Business Profile
• Email accounts on your domain
• Payment processor and e-commerce accounts
• Social media pages and ad accounts

Every one of these should be created under your business, with your designer added as a user. If your designer set them up under their own account years ago, it’s worth fixing now.

How domain transfers actually work

If you ever need to move your domain to a new registrar, you’ll need a transfer code, sometimes called an auth code or EPP code. ICANN, the organization that sets the rules for domain registrars, says your registrar must give you that code within five calendar days of your request. Many registrars let you generate it yourself from the control panel.

One catch: under ICANN’s rules, if you change the registrant name, organization or email, you generally can’t transfer to a different registrar for 60 days afterward. Some registrars let you opt out of that lock, but they don’t have to. So if you need to update the registrant from your old designer to your business and then move registrars, plan ahead.

Check your ownership in one sitting

Grab a coffee and go through this list:

1. Domain: Log in to your registrar. Is your business the registrant? Is auto-renew on? Is the card on file current?
2. Hosting: Do you have a login? If not, do you have a written promise that you can get a full backup on request?
3. Website admin: Do you have an administrator-level login to your site?
4. Google accounts: Are you listed as an owner, not just a user, on Analytics, Search Console and Business Profile?
5. Contract: Does your agreement say who owns the design, content and code?
6. Passwords: Are they stored somewhere safe that doesn’t depend on one person?

If you find gaps, don’t panic. Most designers will happily fix them when asked. If yours won’t, that tells you something. See our list of red flags to watch for with a web designer.

A local example

Say a vacation rental company in Surfside Beach hired a freelancer years ago. The freelancer registered the domain under their own account to keep things simple, set up Analytics on a personal Google login and hosted the site on their own server. Everything worked fine until the freelancer moved away and stopped answering email.

Now the company can’t update its rates, can’t see its traffic and is one missed renewal away from losing its domain. None of it was malicious. It was just never set up with the business as the owner. That’s the most common version of this problem, and it’s entirely preventable.

What about custom software and apps?

The same questions apply, with even more at stake. If you’re paying for a customer portal, booking system or internal tool, you want to know where the code lives, who holds the server accounts and whether you could hand the project to another developer if you had to. Our custom software development work is built with that handoff in mind.

Already want out?

If you’ve realized you don’t control your site and you’re ready to move on, read our step-by-step exit plan for leaving a web company before you send that email.

Not sure what you own?

Axiom Design Group helps businesses from Little River to Pawleys Island sort out exactly what they own and get the keys back where they belong. We’ve delivered more than 1,000 projects over 18+ years, and we’ll give you a straight answer. Contact us or call (843) 839-4113.