EURid, which manages the European Union’s .EU domain, has published its Q2 2019 progress report. According to the quarterly update, .EU is still shrinking. As of June 30, 2019, 3,602,573 names were registered in the domain, while there were 3,661,899 as of March 31.
The report’s authors tend to explain these results by the upcoming Brexit above all. EURid informed British domain owners that they cannot continue to own .EU domains or register new ones after Britain leaves the European Union, which is slated to happen on October 31. It is quite logical in this situation to see British companies and individuals refusing to register or renew .EU domain names. At the end of the second quarter, there were 162,287 UK-based domains in .EU, which is 13.9% less than in the first quarter and almost half (46.7%) of what was registered a year ago.
Domain Incite notes an interesting trend. Many British companies do not want to lose their “European” domain names and transfer them to their branches registered in Ireland. The number of .EU registrations in Ireland, which will not be affected by Brexit, grew 18% in the second quarter and reached 47,781.
