How many domain names are active?
Top level domains, also abbreviated as above with the term : “TLD”, are top level domain names in the existing domain name hierarchy.
These are the domain name extensions that were first introduced to the Internet and have all been added to the root zones of the Internet’s name servers.
Some examples of TLDs (Top level domains)
- .COM domain name (e.g. Wordpress.com)
- .NET domain name (for example, Theory7.net)
- .ORG domain name (e.g. Google.org)
Now the question, how many domains are active per TLD today and what is the market share of these TLD / domain name extensions on the Internet.
Active domain names per TLD
| Number of active domain names | Domain name extension (TLD) |
|---|---|
| .COM | 228,168,536 |
| .TK | 26,663,245 |
| .CN | 26,568,629 |
| .DE | 24,144,224 |
| .NET | 21,001,176 |
| .UK | 20,001,176 |
| .ORG | 16,890,565 |
| .XYZ | 12,284,373 |
| .NU | 10,780,779 |
| .TOP | 9,055,078 |
| . NL | 6,692,885 |
Market share domain names by TLD
| Domain name extension (TLD) | Market share |
|---|---|
| .COM | 37,12% |
| .TK | 4,36% |
| .CN | 4,21% |
| .DE | 3,78% |
| .NET | 3,30% |
| .UK | 3,27% |
| .ORG | 2,6% |
| .XYZ | 1,84% |
| .NU | 1,76% |
| .TOP | 1,48%. |
| .NL | 1,09% |
The domain name extensions I have listed here make up the largest group on the world wide web.
.COM Domain name largest TLD
As you can see, there are over 228 million active registrations of the .COM domain name. That is by far the largest TLD as .TK comes in 2nd largest behind it.
.TK is a CCTLD(Country TLD) with quite a lot of registrations even though the country itself is very small. The rather high number of registrations is because you could register this domain name for free for a certain time. As a result, millions have been registered for free.
.NL Domain Name Extension
As you can see, there are over 6.5 million of the .NL domain name extension registered and active. With a worldwide market share of only 1.09%, it is a rather small domain name extension.
However, for the Netherlands it is the most used domain name extension we know. Almost 1 out of 3 Dutch owns a .NL domain name and therefore has more .NL domain names than any other extension available!