Montenegro tops among largest number of registrations in national domains

By Alimat Aliyeva

Namecheap, one of the world’s leading domain registrars has published some results from its operations over the past year.

According to the report, most registrations made through the company were for the popular top-level domain .COM, with a total of 3,661,899 registrations. The second place on this list was a surprise. For several years, the .XYZ domain had consistently held the second spot. However, this year, it dropped to third place with 519,800 registrations. The runner-up was .SHOP, with 721,532 registrations over the year.

The situation with registrations in national domain zones is even more interesting. Given the massive popularity of Anguilla's national domain, .AI, which has been trending for many months, it would be logical to assume that it would top the list. However, it wasn’t at the top at all. Instead, the national domain of Montenegro, .ME, took the lead, with Namecheap customers registering 143,244 names. Interestingly, .AI came in fourth place, with only 52,715 registrations. It was surpassed not only by the .ME domain but also by the national domains of Colombia (.CO) with 119,134 registrations and the United States (.US) with 92,226 registrations.

It is also noteworthy that the .DEV domain and the national domain of Canada, .CA, have shown the highest renewal rates through Namecheap for several consecutive years. Meanwhile, the average "lifetime" of domain names in the .COM category registered through Namecheap is 2.1 years.

This data highlights some interesting trends in the domain registration market. While .COM remains the dominant global choice, newer, niche domains like .SHOP, .XYZ, and .DEV are gaining traction, with businesses and individuals opting for more targeted or creative web addresses. Furthermore, the growing appeal of regional domains like .AI and .ME reflects the increased globalization of the internet and the growing importance of identity and localization in the online world. With the rise of specialized domains, it’s clear that the domain landscape is evolving rapidly to cater to different markets and needs.