.country Domains: A Generic Ending, Not a Country Code
.country entered the root zone on 28 February 2014, and the IANA record names Internet Naming Co. as the sponsoring organisation. The ending was previously part of the Uniregistry portfolio before the operator changed. The nTLDstats page accessed on 11 August 2026 shows 4,196 names in the zone, of which 2,695 appear in the zone file.
Its name makes it one of the most misread endings around, yet it has no link to any state at all. The second sense of the English word drives the actual use: rural life, the countryside, country music and the outdoors. So the rule reads — if you present a farm, a stable, a barn wedding venue or a music stage, the address lands squarely. Try candidates with a domain name search.
.country is not a ccTLD derived from an ISO country code; it is an open generic ending from the new generation. No government, embassy or public authority operates it, and no tie to any nation is required to register. If a site on this address leaves the impression of being an official body, the visitor has been misled — so state your identity plainly on the page. When you are looking for the official address of a state institution, check that country's own country-code ending instead.
.COUNTRY Domain at a Glance
- Sponsoring organisation Internet Naming Co.
- Root zone record 28 February 2014
- Ending type Generic new-generation ending (not a ccTLD)
- Eligibility condition No verified restriction
- Registered names 4,196 (nTLDstats, 11 August 2026)
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .country domain
- Character Length 3 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.country Domain Prices — No Surprise Fees
Registration, transfer and renewal fees are listed separately. The renewal price can differ from the first-year price, so you see both up front.
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New Registration
$33.90 /year -
Transfer
$37.36 /year -
Renewal
$41.10 /year -
Restore
$109.90 -
Late Renewal
$400.00
Included With Every .country Domain
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Free DNS management
Change A, MX, TXT and CNAME records yourself from the panel — no waiting on anyone when you move a site or mailbox.
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Domain lock
While the lock is on, nobody can move your domain to another registrar without your approval.
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Domain forwarding
Point the domain at your existing site, a campaign page or a social profile — at no extra cost.
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Free WHOIS privacy
Your name, address and phone stay out of public WHOIS records, which cuts down spam and scam calls.
.country Domain Lifecycle
What happens day by day after it expires
Day 0 is the domain's expiry dateIn short: your .country domain is put on Client Hold on its expiry date, so the site and e-mail stop that same day. You can still renew during the first 20 days, but from this point a late renewal fee is added on top of the renewal price. On day 20 the registration is deleted and until day 50 only a paid restore brings it back. Nothing at all can be done in the 5 days that follow, and on day 55 the name is open to anyone. There is exactly one way never to enter this chain: keep auto-renewal on.
Domain Is Available (Available)
A .country address at this stage has not been taken yet, and it goes to whoever registers first. Check the name you have in mind — if it is free, it can be yours within minutes.
Domain Is Active (Active Period)
Once registration is complete, the domain is registered to you for the term you selected. You can renew at any point before it expires to keep it active, or switch on auto-renewal so you never have to watch the date.
Renewal Window (Client Hold)
On its expiry date your .country domain is put on Client Hold: the site and e-mail go down that day, but the registration is still yours. A single renewal within these first 20 days brings everything back exactly as it was — nothing is lost. The only difference is that a $400.00 late renewal fee is now added to the renewal price; renewing before the expiry date avoids that fee entirely.
Redemption Period (Redemption / RGP)
On day 20 the registration is deleted and the 30-day redemption period that ICANN requires of every gTLD registry begins. The name is not released to anyone during this time; only you can take it back, by paying the restore fee, until day 50. That fee is far higher than a renewal — renewing on time is always the cheaper route.
Pending Delete (Pending Delete)
Once the redemption window closes too, the domain enters its final 5 days and there is no way back. Neither renewal nor restore works here; nobody — your registrar included — can return the name to you. The registry uses this window as the last hold before the name goes back into the pool.
Open to Anyone Again (Released)
On day 55 the name .country returns to the pool and anyone can register it. Sought-after names are often gone within seconds, and there is no guaranteed way to get one back. Yet staying out of this timeline is entirely in your hands: leave auto-renewal on and the expiry date will never catch you off guard.
The timeline above is the schedule Atak Domain applies and publishes. The ICANN chart you will find elsewhere shows a renewal window of up to 45 days after expiry; ICANN's policy on expired registrations (section 2.2.1) lets registrars delete an expired domain at any time, provided they disclose their policy in advance. We apply that window as 20 days and publish it here in plain sight. Full text of the policy: ICANN Expired Registration Recovery Policy
.country Domain Specifications and Registration Rules
Registration conditions, supported features and the registry's own timelines in a single table.
.country Domain Registration
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .country domain
- Character Length 3 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.country Domain Support
- IDN Support No
- Transfer Support Yes
- Late Renewal Support Yes
Frequently Asked Questions About .country Domains
The questions people actually ask before registering — answered plainly.
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No — it is not an ending derived from an ISO country code.
Country-code endings are two letters long and run by an authority appointed within that country. .country is a generic new-generation ending, sponsored by Internet Naming Co., and registration requires no tie to any nation. To check a name, run a domain name search.
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Rural life, farming, stables, countryside venues and country music.
The rural sense of the English word holds all of those together. Farm tourism, small-batch produce and outdoor events fit the same frame. If you want a short root paired with your brand name, test several variants together using the bulk domain name search.
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It can, which is why you should say who you are on the page.
Some visitors associate the ending with government, and that misreading causes real trouble on pages offering information or advice. In your about section, give your trading name, your address and a plain statement that you are not a public authority. That protects the visitor and heads off a complaint.
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Use the name of the place or the type of work, and avoid nation names.
Building a root from a country's name is misleading and can raise trademark and naming-rights problems. The name of your farm, your valley or the experience you offer is more distinctive and matches what people search for. With 4,196 registrations in the zone, roots of that kind remain widely open.
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One evokes the rural, the other the urban, and neither is tied to a particular place.
.country speaks to rural life and the outdoors. .city speaks to the idea of a city, yet no municipality operates it and it carries no residence condition. What they share is this: the ending makes an association, not a claim of location. Details sit on the .city domain page.
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Begin by getting the authorisation code from your current registrar.
Because the operator of this ending changed hands in the past, contact details on older records may have gone stale, so confirm that your administrative email still works before you start. The lock must be open and sixty days must have passed since registration. Check the record with whois search, then go to the domain transfer page.
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