Hundreds of new top level domain names (TLDs) have been introduced over the past few years. While fewer TLDs were released in 2016 than the year before, some of the best new options launched in the past year.
Here are five of the best new domain choices that became available in 2016.
.Blog
.Blog is the perfect domain extension for your personal or business blog. Everyone that sees your web address on a .blog domain will know exactly what to expect when they visit your website.
What’s even cooler is that Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com, is also the company behind the .blog domain name. With its marketing muscle, you can be assured that .blog will become a popular domain name for bloggers.
Fun fact: .blog domain names came out only last month but in this short time they’ve already have about 35,000 registrations!
You can pick up .blog domains for $23.88 at Namecheap.
.Shop
This is one of the most highly-anticipated new domain name extensions. A large Japanese internet company paid a whopping $41.5 million for the rights to the TLD, which can be purchased through Namecheap. (It’s on sale for just $6.88 for the first year right now.)
Already, about 100,000 .shop domain names have been registered. If your name of choice is already registered in .shop, two similar TLDs launched this year that you can try: .store and .shopping.
.Cloud
Is your head always in the clouds? You’re in luck—the new domain .cloud is available just for you!
OK, so the target of the .cloud domain is the cloud hosting business, but it’s available for anyone to register.
Namecheap has a special on .cloud domains right now, so you can pick one up for just $9.88. But you need to hurry to get the domain name you want because people have registered over 90,000 .cloud domains already.
.VIP
Finally, a top level domain name for people who never have to wait in line to get into a nightclub!
There are lots of uses for this domain name, but can you guess which country is the most fanatical about .vip?
It’s China! Over a half million .vip domain names have been registered to date!
Register your .VIP domain at Namecheap at a special price of $12.88.
.Games and .Game
Gamers now have a domain name extension to call their own. Actually, they’ve got two.
Both .game and .games came out this year and have been registered by some of the biggest gaming studios, including Electronic Arts and Nintendo.
.Games is proving more popular than .game, and that has a lot to do with its price tag. Namecheap is selling .games domains for $19.88, while .game will set you back $389.88. (This isn’t because Namecheap wants to get rich. The registry for .game set a much higher price than the one for .games.)
What’s in Store for 2017?
There are now hundreds of new choices available beyond .com. Expect more new domain name extensions in 2017. Keep an eye out for everything from .art to .zuerich, coming some time in the new year.
Andrew Allemann is editor of Domain Name Wire, the longest-running blog covering the business of domain names. Domain Name Wire has covered the business of domain name investing for over ten years.
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