The Kenya Network Information Center (KeNIC), the registry of the country’s ccTLD, announced the upcoming price increase for registration of third-level domains and domain name transfer, effective February 3, 2025. The current fee for second-level domains in .KE stands at Ksh2,500 (approximately $19.31) and will not be affected by the changes while registration of third-level domains like co.ke will rise from Ksh700 (around $5.41) to Ksh999 (around $7.72). Transferring a domain name under the management of a different registrar will now cost Ksh999 although the service used to be free.
KeNIC registry clarifies that the price increase is due to inflation and the need for developing the country-level domain’s infrastructure. However, the registry’s stance looks rather inconsistent: CircleID reports that in the past several years, KeNIC has repeatedly deflated fees, attempting to boost the number of registered domain names. In 2019, there were 93,446 .KE domain names, with a goal to exceed 100,000 registrations.
This goal was achieved but in recent years, the ccTLD has remained stagnant. Analysts offer several explanations, including high competition with older gTLDs such as .COM and .ORG, as well as new domains like .XYZ, .SHOP, .ONLINE, and .AFRICA. KeNIC is often criticized for insufficient transparency and almost complete lack of marketing activity. It’s hard to predict how the announced price increase will affect the number of registrations.
