What is a domain registrar (and how is it different from hosting)?

A domain registrar is the company you register your domain name through — it records you as the holder of the name and manages its renewal, its contact details and the technical settings that say where the domain points:

• Hosting is a separate service — the computer your actual website files live on.
• Routinely bundled, but independent — the two are often sold by the same company, which is why they blur together, but you can keep a domain at one company and host the website at another, and moving one never requires moving the other.
• Control is the crux — in a dispute or a migration, whoever controls the registrar account controls the domain itself, and with it the website, the email and everything attached to the name.

Know which company is your registrar and which is your host before the day you need to know.