The DLV record's format is identical to the DS record, which is used to form the chain of trust from a parent zone to a child zone. The difference between the DS and the DLV is that the latter is stored in a zone outside the delegation chain itself, and is accessed by a specially designated query directed to a DLV service.

The DLV record consists of the key identifier tag calculated for the key it identifies, security algorithm identifier of the key, hash algorithm identifier of the DLV record itself and a digest value (hexadecimal string) of the originating DNSKEY created using the hash algorithm.