Verisign Q3 2017 Domain Name Industry Brief: 330.7 Million Domain Names on the Internet in the Third Quarter of 2017

Today, we released the latest issue of the Domain Name Industry Brief, which showed that the third quarter of 2017 closed with approximately 330.7 million domain name registrations across all top-level domains (TLDs),  a decrease of  approximately 1.2 million domain name registrations as of Sept. 30, 2017.^1,2 This is a 0.4. percent decrease over the second quarter of 2017 and a 1.1 percent increase, year over year. ^1,2

.com and .net Breakdown

The .com and .net TLDs had a combined total of approximately 145.8 million domain name registrations in the domain name base in the third quarter of 2017.³ New .com and .net domain name registrations totaled 8.9 million during the third quarter of 2017. In the third quarter of 2016, new .com and .net domain name registrations totaled 8.3 million.

TLD Breakdown

In the third quarter of 2017, the top 10 TLDs in order by zone size were:

ccTLD Breakdown

Total country-code TLD (ccTLD) domain name registrations were approximately 144.7 million in the third quarter of 2017, with an increase of 0.4 million domain name registrations, or a 0.3 percent increase compared to the second quarter of 2017. ^1,2  ccTLDs increased by approximately 4.5 million domain name registrations, or 3.2 percent, year over year.^1,2 As of September 30, 2017, the top 10 ccTLDs by zone size were:

New gTLD Breakdown

As of September 30, 2017, new gTLDs (ngTLDs) totaled 21.1 million domain name registrations, which represents 6.4 percent of total domain name registrations. The top 10 ngTLDs represented 54.2 percent of all ngTLD domain name registrations. The following chart shows ngTLD domain name registrations as a percentage of overall TLD domain name registrations, and also the top 10 ngTLDs as a percentage of all ngTLD domain name registrations for the third quarter of 2017.

For more domain stats from the third quarter of 2017, check out the latest issue of the Domain Name Industry Brief.

1. tk is a free ccTLD that provides free domain names to individuals and businesses. Revenue is generated by monetizing expired domain names. Domain names no longer in use by the registrant or expired are taken back by the registry and the residual traffic is sold to advertising networks. As such, there are no deleted .tk domain names. http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20131216006048/en/Freenom-Closes-3M-Series-Funding#.UxeUGNJDv9s. The .tk zone reflected here is based on data from Q3 2016, which is the most recent data available.
2. The generic top-level (gTLD) and ccTLD data cited in this brief: (i) includes ccTLD Internationalized Domain Names, (ii) is an estimate as of the time this brief was developed and (iii) is subject to change as more complete data is received.
3. The domain name base is the active zone plus the number of domain names that are registered but not configured for use in the respective Top-Level Domain zone file plus the number of domain names that are in a client or server hold status.