Internet grows by 0.9% to 332.4 million domains in 2017 (.com & .net grow, New gTLDs lose 5 million domains)

Verisign released the latest issue of the Domain Name Industry Brief, which showed that the fourth quarter of 2017 closed with approximately 332.4 million domain name registrations across all top-level domains (TLDs),  an increase of  approximately 1.7 million domain name registrations as of Dec. 31, 2017.^1,2 This is a 0.5 percent increase over the third quarter of 2017 and a 0.9 percent increase, year over year. ^1,2

As of December 31, 2017, new gTLDs (ngTLDs) totaled 20.6 million or 6.2 percent of total domain name registrations across all TLDs.  This is a decrease of approximately 0.5 million domain name registrations, or 2.4 percent, over the third quarter of 2017

ngTLD domain name registrations decreased by approximately 5.0 million domain name registrations, or 19.5 percent, year over year

.com and .net Breakdown

The .com and .net TLDs had a combined total of approximately 146.4 million domain name registrations in the domain name base at the end of the fourth quarter of 2017.³ This represents a 2.9 percent increase year over year.  New .com and .net domain name registrations totaled 9.0 million during the fourth quarter of 2017, compared  to 8.8 million for the fourth quarter of 2016.

As of Dec. 31, 2017, the .com domain name base totaled 131.9 million domain name registrations, while the .net domain name base totaled 14.5 million domain name registrations.

TLD Breakdown

In the fourth 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 146.1 million in the fourth quarter of 2017, with an increase of 1.4 million domain name registrations, or a 1.0 percent increase compared to the third quarter of 2017. ^1,2  ccTLDs increased by approximately 3.4 million domain name registrations, or 2.4 percent, year over year.^1,2 As of Dec. 31, 2017, the top 10 ccTLDs by zone size were:New gTLD Breakdown

As of Dec. 31, 2017, total new gTLDs (ngTLDs) domain name registrations were approximately 20.6 million or 6.2 percent of total domain name registrations across all TLDs.  This is a decrease of approximately 0.5 million domain name registrations, or 2.4 percent, over the third quarter of 2017. ngTLD domain name registrations decreased by approximately 5.0 million domain name registrations, or 19.5 percent, year over year. The top 10 ngTLDs represented 48.9 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 fourth quarter of 2017.

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

You can find the full report here and the news release here.

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1. The figure(s) includes domain names in the .tk ccTLD. .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.