How to Transfer an ENS Domain: Roles and Handover

To transfer an ENS domain, use the current official app’s Ownership controls and verify each role afterward. Send is designed for moving a whole name to one wallet; Edit roles changes roles independently. A token transfer, a record update and a complete handover can produce different results.

Plan the handover around the actual roles

Write these answers before opening the transfer controls. If the recipient is another person, obtain the intended address through an independently verified channel. If you are moving between your own wallets, confirm that the destination is the account you can actually operate.

Renewal responsibility belongs in the same brief. Moving control and extending a registration are different tasks. Use the renewal guide to check the existing term rather than assuming a transfer starts a new one.

Use Send for the intended bundled transfer

According to the current ENS transfer instructions:

1. Connect the Owner wallet at app.ens.domains, find the name and open Ownership.
2. Choose Send and enter the verified recipient.
3. Review the summary of roles that will move. Decide deliberately whether Reset profile should clear the name’s records.
4. Review each wallet request and complete the sequence. The documented order is ETH Address, Manager, then Owner.
5. After confirmation, inspect the resulting addresses on Ownership.

Important exception: Send only moves roles that currently point to the Owner’s wallet. If Manager or ETH Address is already assigned elsewhere, that role stays. Do not infer a complete handover from the Owner change alone.

When Edit roles is the better match

Use Edit roles when the final arrangement intentionally splits ownership, management and receiving address across wallets. The official path is Ownership, Edit roles, then the relevant role’s Change control. Review and confirm each separate change with the wallet that has permission.

For wrapped names there is no separate Manager field. A missing control can therefore reflect the name type or the connected wallet’s permissions. Do not make an unrelated transfer simply to reproduce a screenshot from an older tutorial.

These actions use Ethereum Mainnet gas. This article summarizes documentation; we did not carry out a wallet handover.

A handover example that catches the exception

Suppose a studio’s Owner is wallet A, its Manager is wallet B and its receiving address is wallet C. The studio wants a new maintainer to control the full setup through wallet D. Moving the NFT from A to D is only one part of that plan.

The studio compares all three current entries with the intended final entries. Because the other roles were already split, it checks which changes the selected app flow will actually make. It completes any permitted remaining edits and has the recipient independently review the result.

This example is an editorial checklist, not a transaction we executed. Its purpose is to prevent “the token arrived” from becoming the only acceptance criterion.

Verify the result with the recipient

• Reopen the exact name and check the new Owner.
• Confirm record-management permission and the intended receiving addresses.
• Review any profile-reset choice and remaining public information.
• Have the recipient check the intended app lookup and configure their own primary name if needed.
• Save the expiry and confirmed transaction references in the maintenance record.

The address-record guide covers destination changes. Removing public profile values does not erase earlier onchain history. Use a specific checklist for what the buyer or maintainer needs to accept.

Do not substitute a direct transfer for sale settlement

Sending a name to a supposed buyer does not itself collect payment. Use the selling guide to understand marketplace listings, offers and confirmed proceeds. Verify those trade conditions before treating a recipient address as an instruction to release an asset.

For a .base.eth name, follow the project’s Basename transfer instructions. The .eth workflow here is not a universal transfer procedure for every Web3 name.