Verisign Domain Name Industry Brief: Internet Grows to 330.6 Million Domain Names in Q1 2017

Today, we released the latest issue of the Domain Name Industry Brief, which showed that the internet grew by approximately 1.3 million domain names in the first quarter of 2017, and closed with a base of 330.6 million domain names across all top-level domains (TLDs).^1,2 This is a 3.7 percent increase, year over year.^1,2

.com and .net Breakdown

The .com and .net TLDs had a combined total of approximately 143.6 million domain name registrations in the domain name base in the first quarter of 2017.³ New .com and .net domain name registrations totaled 9.5 million during the first quarter of 2017. In the first quarter of 2016, new .com and .net domain name registrations totaled 10 million.

TLD Breakdown

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

ccTLD Breakdown

Total country-code top-level domains (ccTLDs) were approximately 143.1 million in the first quarter of 2017, with an increase of 408,242 domain name registrations, or a 0.3 percent increase compared to the fourth quarter of 2016.^1,2 As of March 31, 2017, the top 10 ccTLDs by zone size were:

New gTLD Breakdown

As of March 31, 2017, new gTLDs (ngTLDs) totaled 25.4 million domain name registrations, which represents 7.7 percent of total domain name registrations. The top 10 ngTLDs represented 64.1 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 first quarter of 2017.

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

1. .tk is a ccTLD that is provided for free to individuals and businesses worldwide (http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20131216006048/en/Freenom-Closes-3MSeries-Funding#.UxeUGNJDv9s). The zone size for .tk was last estimated by Zooknic in Q4 2014 and this zone size was subsequently used in the Q4 2014 through Q2 2016 DNIBs. In Q3 2016, Zooknic reported a significant decline in the .tk zone and restated the estimated zone size of .tk for each quarter from Q4 2014 through Q3 2016 using a proprietary methodology. As a result, for comparative purposes of this DNIB to the Q1 2016 DNIB, Verisign has applied an updated estimate of the total zone size across all TLDs for Q1 2016 of 318.8 million and an updated estimate of the total ccTLD zone size for Q1 2016 of 140.6 million.
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. status