How many domain registrars do you use?

[MichaelCorfman]

My suspicion is that most folks either use, or try to use, a single domain registrar. It certainly makes managing domains easier.

So, for this week's poll I ask how many domain registrars you currently use. Besides voting in the poll, please share the registrars you use, why you use them, and what you think of them in a post.

Here is my take on the answer to that question for Casino City.

Right now we use five domain registrars. Our new domain registrar of choice is Netim. We started using them in February of this year, and already more than 75% of the domains we own are registered through them. We first looked at using Netim because they support registering a large number of different country top level domains at very reasonable prices, and we wanted to expand the number of country tld domains we own. We owned a fair number of such domains before, but we now own domains based over 100 different country tlds. Another plus is that they have an API that made it easy for us to automate monitoring the status of the domains we own. And we've generally found their support to be good, particularly around some of the complexities of international domain registrations.

Our previous domain registrar of choice was Moniker, and we still have 20% of our domains registered with them, although I expect to move virtually all of those domains to Netim over the next few months as we get closer to their renewal dates. We have a half dozen domains with Marcaria. They support some country domains that are not easily registered elsewhere, and their support can be outstanding dealing with the complex back-and-forth when a registrar imposes special scrutiny on proposed domain names that incorporate what they consider to be the sensitive term "casino." I've had to work with them to provide trademark registrations, affidavits on how a domain will be used and other legal complexities. And we have one domain registered with EuroDNS because none of the other registrars we work with support the tld. But my absolute favorite registration story regards a Caribbean island nation. There we submitted a scanned paper domain registration request form to the local University department whose staff processes such requests and grants domain registrations that last indefinitely at no cost.

Michael

[tufty]

I used to use loads but this year I got round to a job I wanted to do for years but could never be bothered with because there was always a much better use of time - move them all to one registrar. So now nearly all domains are with namecheap. I think only a couple are extensions namecheap doesn't accept, so they could not be moved. Namecheap are a lot cheaper than the quite expensive European based companies I had domains dotted about with and their interface is easy and comprehensive. It was actually quite an easy process and I somehow avoided paying the fees to transfer out I had thought I would be paying. It seems they are only due if you get the registrar you are moving from to do the work. There is a workaround but I cant remember the details. The incentive was being 'tidy', given everything was all over the place. It wasn't so much about saving money, more the nagging guilty feeling (for the last 15 years) that I was being seriously ripped off by some, mainly UK, registrars on renewal. I maybe have 50 or 75 domains, most listed for sale on sedo.

[agsgroup]

I use one; probably could find a cheaper deal but as tufty said, its a job to transfer them all and I would prefer to spend time on other things. It it ain't broke don;t fix it type of thing for me.

[AVC-Invest]

Hi Michael,

thank-you for all the details you gave.

I currently use 3 domain registrar's. They Include; 123reg, GoDaddy & NameCheap.

I most recently have started to use NameCheap and have to say, their support, specifically the online chat has been excellent. I have purchased and transferred a few domains to them and has went smoothly. The cost of the domains are also cheaper than other registrar's i use.

I would like to reduce to just 1 registrar for simplicity, but NameCheap don't cover all the country TLD's that I have or want to add in the future, so no doubt will continue to have at least 2 registrar's going forward.

[Cash Bonus]

I have 5 domain name registrars and when I first started as an affiliate a long time ago in the early 2000s, I bought too many domain names, and most of them I never started working on and just let them expire.

[Dsquared]

I use 2 at present. I did test out Google domains lately for one but honestly prefer to have them all in one place.