Every time a browser loads a domain name, it must translate that name into an IP address before a single byte of the page can be requested. This is the job of the Domain Name System (DNS) — a distributed, hierarchical database. A recursive resolver (usually run by your ISP or a public service) does the legwork on your behalf, walking down the naming hierarchy one label at a time.
.com) and refers the resolver there.There are only 13 named root server addresses, but they are served from hundreds of physical locations worldwide via anycast routing, so "root server 198.41.0.4" might actually answer from a data centre a few kilometres from you.
Watch a DNS query packet travel the real resolution chain — client to recursive resolver, then out to the root server, the TLD server and finally the authoritative server — before the resolved IP address travels all the way back.
Each glowing hop is a real DNS referral step: the root server points to a TLD, the TLD points to the domain's name servers, and only the authoritative server actually holds the answer. A warm resolver cache short-circuits the whole chain.
Pick a sample domain (including one that fails to resolve), toggle whether the resolver's cache is already warm, adjust query speed, then press Send query and follow the log as each hop resolves.
A cold DNS lookup typically takes only tens of milliseconds in the real world — the animation is deliberately slowed down so every hop in the referral chain is visible.