I literally mean everything, I copied this verbatim from a real DNS request using Wireshark. (DNS packets are binary but we’re showing a human-readable representation here)

Let’s look at the actual data being sent during a DNS query:

Illustration of a browser, represented by the Firefox logo of a fox wrapped around a globe, talking to a resolver, represented by a box with a smiley face holding a magnifying glass.

browser: what’s the IP for example.com?
resolver: 93.184.216.34!

request

Query ID: 0x05a8
(randomly generated)
Flags: 0x1000
(these flags just mean “this is a request”)
Questions: 1 Answer records: 0
Authority records: 0
Additional records: 0
Question:
Name: example.com
Type: A (A is for IPv4 address. other types: MX, CNAME, AAAA, etc) Class: IN`
(IN stands for “INternet”)

response

Query ID: 0x05a8
(matches request ID)

Flags: 0x8580
the response code is encoded in the last 4 bits of these flags. The 3 main response codes are: - NOERROR (success!) - NXDOMAIN (doesn’t exist!) - SERVFAIL (error!)

Questions: 1   
Answer records: 1   
Authority records: 0    
Additional records: 0  

(copied from request)

Question:   
Name: example.com    

(domain names aren’t case sensitive)

Type: A   
Class: IN   
Answer records:   
Name: example.com   
Type: A   
Class: IN   
TTL: 86400   
Content: 93.184.216.34   

(the IP we asked for)

Authority records:   
(empty)   
Additional records:   
(empty)   

page 12 (“NS records”) talks more about these 2 sections

Illustration of a smiling stick figure with curly hair.

Person: I’m always surprised by how little is actually in a DNS packet!