The cheapest domain names on the Internet and where to buy them

Buying a domain for our website can cost less than one euro. The problem is that many companies use these prices as bait, and when it's time to renew, we discover that we have to pay ten or twenty times more.

That's why, if we want a cheap domain, what matters isn't how much the first year costs, but how much we'll pay to renew it.. 

Let's look at which extensions are the most affordable and where we can buy them.

The cheapest global domains

First, we need to understand that there are two types of domains: global ones, which work for any website in the world, and local ones, which are generally aimed at an audience in a particular country..

Yes, a local domain can be accessed worldwide, but frankly, it's not ideal.

Although .com is the best known, there are hundreds of extensions we can use for our website: .net, .org, .xyz, .top, .vip, .digital and many others.

Their prices vary enormously, so we can group them into four categories according to their annual renewal cost.

Category	Annual renewal	Extensions
Very cheap	Up to €6	.click, .ovh, .link, .top, .vip, .stream, .bid, .date, .loan, .party, .trade, .men, .win, .download, .work
Cheap	€6 to €10	.cyou, .cfd, .faith, .science, .review, .racing, .business, .sbs, .bond, .icu
Standard	€10 to €20	.com, .net, .org, .xyz, .dev, .app, .info, .biz, .me, .fun, .space, .company, .agency
Expensive	Over €20	.digital, .online, .site, .club, .tech, .ai, .io, .co, .store, .shop, .design, .software, .finance, .marketing, .consulting, .studio, .inc, .global

These are indicative prices for regular, non-premium domains, based on competitive renewal deals such as those I'll show you below.

Among the cheapest are .top, .vip and .link, with renewals costing around 4 or 5 dollars a year. There are also less common extensions, such as .bid, .loan or .date, which cost roughly the same.

If you ask me, I think .top is really top-notch, hehe.

Extensions such as .com, .net and .org tend to fall somewhere in the middle, although you can find renewal deals for less than 10 euros..

Finally, extensions such as .digital, .tech or .ai can be much more expensive. A domain ending in .ai, for example, can cost close to 80 dollars per year.

Local domains can also be very cheap

Alongside global domains, there are country-code domains associated with countries or regions. For example, .es belongs to Spain, .de to Germany and .fr to France.

Some are cheaper than global extensions.

Extension	Territory	Annual renewal price found
.de	Germany	$3.95 — Spaceship
.es	Spain	€4.92 — STRATO
.uk	United Kingdom	$5.30 — Cloudflare
.nl	Netherlands	$5.13 — Above.com
.it	Italy	$5.49 — Crazy Domains
.fr	France	$7.00 — Dynadot
.eu	European Union	€8.40 — STRATO
.pt	Portugal	$11.56 — Dynadot
.cat	Catalonia	€18 — STRATO

Bear in mind that:

• These are the renewal prices published by registrars or listed by TLD-List. 
• STRATO's euro prices exclude VAT. 
• Dollar prices have not been converted.

It's worth remembering that some country-code domains have specific eligibility requirements, such as living in a particular country or economic region.

For a business that operates mainly in Spain, a .es is very tempting. It's familiar, conveys a local connection and can be renewed for less than five euros before tax.

Where to buy the cheapest domains

No single company always has the best prices for every extension. These are usually among the most competitively priced:

Registrar	Attractive renewal prices
Cloudflare	.com and other global extensions
STRATO	.es for €4.92, .net and .org for €8.40
Spaceship	.top for $4.05 and .vip for $4.90
Porkbun	.stream for $4.59 and several extensions such as .bid, .date or .loan for $4.98
NameSilo	.link for $3.99
OVHcloud	.ovh for $3.49

For .com domains, I prefer Cloudflare

Cloudflare has one advantage: it sells domains at cost, without adding a markup to renewals. A .com costs around 10–11 dollars a year.

The main limitation is that if we register a domain with Cloudflare, we have to use its DNS servers. We can host the website elsewhere, but DNS management stays with Cloudflare.

For .es domains, STRATO

STRATO offers .es domains for €4.92 a year to renew, excluding VAT. It also has competitive prices for .net and .org.

For the cheapest extensions, Spaceship and Porkbun

If the aim is to spend as little as possible, I'd particularly check Spaceship and Porkbun. Between them, they offer plenty of extensions that renew for around five dollars a year.

We can also use TLD-List, a comparison site that shows the registration, renewal and transfer costs of each extension at different companies. It's best to sort the results by renewal price, not registration price.

Can you get free domain names?

Yes, although they generally come with more limitations than paid ones.

One interesting example is DigitalPlat FreeDomain, a free project that offers addresses with endings such as:

• .dpdns.org
• .us.kg
• .qzz.io
• .xx.kg
• .qd.je

We can configure their DNS and use them to publish websites. The difference is that we aren't registering an independent domain, like a .com or .es, but using a subdomain of a domain managed by another organization.

For learning, testing or publishing small personal projects, I think it's an interesting option. However, I wouldn't recommend it for a business, because we'd depend on the provider maintaining the service and its terms.

Conclusions: which domain I'd choose for my project

Straight to the point:

For a serious international project, my first choice would be a .com at Cloudflare. 

For a website aimed at Spain, I'd choose an inexpensive .es at STRATO. 

And if I wanted to experiment with several projects while spending as little as possible, I'd look for a .top, .vip or another extension I could renew for less than six euros.

I also wouldn't rule out paying a little more if I found a particularly good name. The difference between renewing a domain for 5 or 12 euros a year is irrelevant for a business.

What I would avoid is buying an extension that costs one euro in the first year and forty in subsequent years without realizing it.

In the end, the best domain isn't the cheapest one, but one we can remember, that suits our project and that we can keep for years without overpaying..