Verisign has published its traditional quarterly report, the Domain Name Industry Brief (DNIB). It summarizes the results of the third quarter of 2020 saying that domain growth dropped sharply in July-September. The simplest and most obvious explanation is that this quarter saw a significant easing or a complete removal of lockdown restrictions that were previously the main growth driver, according to Domain Incite.
As of the end of September, the total number of registered domain names reached 370.7 million, which is three percent higher than in the same period last year and only 0.2 percent higher than last quarter. At the same time, .COM grew one percent and finished with 150.3 million registrations against 148.7 million three months earlier, and ccTLDs saw 500,000 new registrations. The total number of domains registered there reached 160.6 million at the end of September, which is still 1.2 million less than last year though.
The .NET domain zone remained flat with 13.4 million domains, while new gTLDs lost 1.5 million domains in total: they account for 30.2 million registrations. Among the other casualties, the notable standout was .UK, Great Britain’s ccTLD, which lost a full million registrations during the third quarter.
