Quad9
Free public DNS resolver that blocks known malicious domains.
- Swiss CompanyThe operating company is headquartered and legally incorporated in Switzerland.
- Swiss OwnedThe ultimate controlling owner is Swiss (Swiss persons, companies, foundations or public bodies).
- Free PlanA permanently free plan is available (not just a trial).
quad9.net
Overview
Quad9 is a free public recursive DNS resolver operated by the Quad9 Foundation, a not-for-profit foundation registered in Zurich. Its main address, 9.9.9.9, validates DNSSEC and refuses to resolve domains that its threat-intelligence partners flag as malicious, such as phishing or malware sites. Alternative addresses offer resolution without blocking (9.9.9.10) or with EDNS Client Subnet (9.9.9.11). Besides unencrypted DNS, the service supports DNS over HTTPS, DNS over TLS and DNSCrypt. The service is free and needs no account; devices or routers are configured to use the resolver directly.
Quad9 was set up by the Global Cyber Alliance, IBM and Packet Clearing House and launched publicly in 2017. It moved its headquarters from California to Zurich in 2021; the foundation is supervised by the Swiss Federal Department of Home Affairs and is funded by sponsorships, grants and donations. Quad9 states that it does not record user IP addresses and applies Swiss data protection law to all users.
The resolvers are not concentrated in Switzerland: Quad9 operates an anycast network of more than 245 locations in over 115 countries, built largely on infrastructure from Packet Clearing House and other in-kind partners, and queries are answered at the nearest location. Quad9 has contested court orders to block copyright-infringing domains in Germany and France; because it cannot limit blocking to one country, blocks it applies take effect for all users.
Why it may be a Swiss alternative
Quad9 is operated by Quad9 Foundation, which is headquartered in Zürich. Swiss-headquartered company. Ownership is mixed or not fully verified, or development happens mainly abroad.
Note: although the company is Swiss, customer data is not hosted in Switzerland.
May replace
Foreign products with overlapping functionality. An alternative is not necessarily a one-to-one replacement.
Swiss footprint
Five independent questions. A Swiss company is not automatically Swiss-hosted — and vice versa. How the footprint is assessed
Swiss company. Swiss-headquartered company. Ownership is mixed or not fully verified, or development happens mainly abroad.
- HeadquartersIs the operating company headquartered in Switzerland?
- Zürich, Zurich (ZH), SwitzerlandVerified[1]
- Legal jurisdiction
- OwnershipIs the company ultimately Swiss-owned?
- YesVerified[2]
A foundation under Swiss law has no shareholders. Quad9 is governed by its foundation council, which includes members from Switzerland and abroad, and is supervised by the Swiss Federal Department of Home Affairs. Its operating budget comes from sponsorships, grants and donations; founding sponsors were the Global Cyber Alliance, IBM and Packet Clearing House.
- DevelopmentIs the product developed in Switzerland?
- Unknown / not verified
Quad9 is governed from Zurich, but its network infrastructure is provided by Packet Clearing House and other partners, and it does not publish where its engineering staff work.
- HostingIs customer data hosted in Switzerland?
- NoVendor claim[4]
Quad9 is an anycast service: queries are answered at the nearest of more than 245 locations in over 115 countries, so it is not hosted in Switzerland as such. Quad9 states that it does not record user IP addresses and that client IP data does not leave the location where the query is received, apart from limited data used to defend against attacks.
- InfrastructureIs the hosting infrastructure operated by a Swiss-owned provider?
- No — Packet Clearing House, with in-kind hosting partners · United StatesVendor claim[5]
Features & platforms
- Platforms
- Unknown / not verified
- Deployment
- Made for
- Interface languages
- Unknown / not verified
- Launched
- 2017
Privacy & security
- Encryption in transit
- Partly
- Not verified
- End-to-end encryption, Encryption at rest, Multi-factor authentication, Single sign-on (SAML/OIDC), SCIM provisioning, Public API and Data export
- Certifications
- None listed
Pricing
- Pricing model
- Free
- Free plan
- Yes
- Free trial
- Unknown / not verified
- Enterprise plan
- Unknown / not verified
- Billing in CHF
- Unknown / not verified
Prices checked 15 Oct 2026. Always confirm on the vendor’s site. Pricing page ↗
Open source
- Open source
- PartlyInferred[6]
The resolvers run open-source DNS software (dnsdist, PowerDNS Recursor, Unbound and, as of 2020, BIND 9). The threat-intelligence blocklists come from third-party partners and are not published.
- Source code
- github.com/Quad9DNS
- GitHub
- 14 public repositories
- last commit
Statistics from GitHub, fetched 15 Oct 2026.
Company
Not-for-profit foundation in Zurich that operates the Quad9 public DNS resolver. It moved its headquarters from California to Switzerland in 2021.
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Sources & verification
Every claim on this page is marked as verified, vendor claim or inferred. Unknown means we could not confirm it — not that the answer is “no”.
- Verified Confirmed by an independent or official source such as the commercial register.
- Vendor claim Stated by the vendor in its own documentation, website or legal terms.
- Inferred Derived by the editors from indirect evidence — see the note.
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Quad9 Foundation
- [1]
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- [5]