Five Best Domain Name Registrars
A
domain name is the magic that turns a raw IP address like 69.60.7.199
into a human-friendly chunk of text like Lifehacker.com. Here's a look
at five of the most popular domain name registrars that help you
register and manage your domains.
Earlier this week we asked you to share your favorite domain registrar,
and now we're back to highlight the five most popular responses. For
the sake of establishing a baseline for comparison, we've noted the
price of a one year .COM registration at each registrar beside their
name. We'd urge you to read the fine print at each registrar, however,
because saving $3 on a registration isn't much of a savings if you miss
out on useful auxiliary features (like free domain parking, email
forwarding, etc.) the slightly more expensive registrar offers.
Namecheap (1 Year Registration: $9.98)
Domain
registration at Namecheap is economical, as their name implies, but
Namecheap hasn't built a name for itself just by offering the absolute
cheapest deals in town. Namecheap's reputation rests on fantastic
customer service and value-added packages. You get solid customer
service, free email and URL forwarding, free and customizable domain
parking, free domain transfers, dynamic DNS services if you want to
redirect a domain to your home server, and more. You can jump right to
their pricing schedule here or read more about their free features here.
1&1 (1 Year Registration: $4.99)
All 1&1
domain registrations include a simple five-page starter website
(consider it a "super" domain parking package), an email account with
2GB of storage, and free private domain registration to shield your
personal information. 1&1 also offers free domain transfer. You can
view their price schedule here or read more about their domain packages here.
Go Daddy (1 Year Registration: $11.99)
Go Daddy
has built a customer base by offering cheap package deals (combining
domain registration and web hosting) as well as frequent specials on
domain registration. Go Daddy registrations include what amounts to a
free mini-hosting plan. You get a five-page web site based on one of
their templates, a photo album, blogging tools, and an email account
with 1GB of storage. Although Go Daddy doesn't offer free private
registration, if you register five or more domains, it's free for all of
them. You can read more about their pricing schedule and extras here.
Name (1 Year Registration: $9.99)
Name.com
goes beyond simple domain name searches and offers alternative
suggestions including domain names that are currently held but up for
auction. While the majority of us are looking to register domains
cheaply and quickly, it's good to know that the domain other services
would simply flag as "Unavailable" is actually up for auction. Name.com
also has a service called Domain Grabber. If you really want a domain
but it's unavailable, you can pay Name.com (typically between $20-50) to
pounce on the domain should it become available. If simple domain
registration is all you need, however, you can read more about their pricing schedule here.
Gandi (1 Year Registration: €12/$16.85)
Gandi's mission as a registrar and host is to offer clean, simple, no bullshit
service. Every registration includes two free SiteMaker pages, one free
DotClear2 blog, private domain registration, a free 1-year SSL
certificate, and a personal email. If you manage a large number of
domains, Gandi also offers a user-friendly dashboard with tag-based
organization and search. You can read more about
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