GitHub
GitHub username checker
Check a GitHub username — one of the few that answers honestly every time.
Checked alongside your domain and every other platform.
The rules
- Up to 39 characters.
- Letters, numbers and single hyphens. No underscores, no full stops.
- It can't start or end with a hyphen, or use two in a row.
How we check it
GitHub publishes a documented, unauthenticated user endpoint, so a 404 here genuinely means the name is free. It is the most dependable check on the list that needs no credentials.
GitHub rate-limits anonymous callers. When it does, the row says Unknown rather than guessing. A short list of names GitHub keeps for its own pages reports as taken, because nobody can register them even though the API 404s on some.
One name, users and organisations both
GitHub draws personal accounts and organisations from the same pool. Taking the username for yourself takes it from the company you might later want to name the same thing — which is usually the point.
Hyphens are the only separator you get
No underscores and no dots means a two-word name is either run together or hyphenated. Whichever you pick, check the other platforms for the same shape — most of them won't accept a hyphen at all.