Organization Validation Certificate (OV Certificate)
Why You Should Care About OV Certificate
OV certificates sit between DV and EV in terms of identity verification. The CA confirms the organization's legal name, address, and domain ownership before issuance. This provides some assurance that the certificate holder is a real organization, but this information is only visible if a user manually inspects the certificate details.
In practice, OV certificates are rarely the right choice. They cost more than free DV certificates and require a manual verification process that takes one to three business days, but they do not receive any visible browser distinction over DV. Users cannot tell the difference without clicking the lock icon and reading the certificate details, which almost nobody does.
OV certificates may be required by certain compliance frameworks or industry standards. Some enterprise procurement processes also specify OV or EV certificates. But from a purely security and usability perspective, the encryption is identical across all validation levels, and the identity information in OV certificates goes unseen by almost all visitors.
How to Check
An SSL checker shows the certificate subject field. OV certificates include an Organization (O) field with the company name, while DV certificates only show the domain. The checker may also identify the validation level directly.