On May 12, 2018, the Russian ccTLD .РФ turns 8. Today .РФ is the most successful IDN and the world’s largest Cyrillic domain zone. Russians rightly take pride in these impressive figures.
For example, 93 percent of .РФ domain names are registered by Russian citizens, with almost 400,000 (or 47.6 percent) used for active websites and apps. This very high number shows that users like this domain and really use it, as opposed to registering names “just in case.”
As of today, more than 830,000 domain names are registered in the .РФ ccTLD. Registration is provided by 46 accredited registrars working with over 380,000 administrators, or slightly over two domain names per administrator.
In total, over 2,800,000 domain names have been registered during the eight years the domain has existed. As of today, 256,000 .РФ domain names (31 percent) are over five years old.
“The .РФ ccTLD is something to be proud of. It has proven that it is popular and irreplaceable for many Russian businesses. All Russians are used to it and understand it. The fact that a large nucleus – 31 percent of the domain names – are more than five years old demonstrates that today .РФ stands side by side with traditional ccTLDs and is developing as fast as they are. So let me thank everyone who is developing it together with us. Happy birthday, .РФ!” Director of the Coordination Center for TLD .RU/.РФ Andrey Vorobyev said.
