What’s the Best Place to Purchase Your Domain Name From?

Last Updated on April 20, 2023 by 94 Comments

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What’s the Best Place to Purchase Your Domain Name From?
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One would think that purchasing a domain name is a relatively simple process. Go to Google, type in “best place to purchase domain name,” clickity-clickity, and you’re done. Ta-da!

Unfortunately, there is a bit more to it than that. At least, when you plan on actually using that domain. Finding the best place to purchase a domain name is important. You’re probably going to be with that service for years, after all.

Finding the best domain registrar for you is a combination of cost, services offered, and support. Not every company will work for every person or company, but depending on your needs, I’m confident we can find one that will work.

Namecheap

best place to purchase domain name

Namecheap has become one of the top domain registrars around. It may not be as well-known as some of the others, but it consistently outperforms other companies in cost, services, and support.

They have deals pretty often for different domain extensions as low as $0.88 USD, though it’s rare to find something like a .com at that price. Most prices tend to be around $10-12 USD, with specialty domains such as .blog, .tech, and .io running between $20-60 USD per year.

The main draw of Namecheap, in my opinion, is the quality of their overall platform. From managing DNS to ownership/registrar transfers, they are reliable and easy to use (even if you’re not familiar with the ins-ands-outs fo domain management).

Additionally, newly registered domains come with free WHOIS privacy for the first year. (And $2.88 USD per year afterward–considerably cheaper than most other places). You will save you a pretty penny if you register or transfer in bulk. Plus, their support has been quick to respond and fix every issue I’ve personally had within a day each time.

Google Domains

best place to purchase domain name

Google Domains is finally out of the invite-only phase of its deployment, and it is exactly what you’d expect out of a Google-run domain registrar. Things are simple, clean, and straightforward, and for the most part…they just work.

The real benefits in my mind of using Google Domains is the ease with which you can get things up and running. Your entire domain list is consolidated in your Google account, so if you use G-suite for work or Gmail et al for personal use, you’re good to go (with payment information likely already stored, so that’s a bonus).

There are a couple of downsides to the service, the first of which is that there are never any discounts (at least that I’ve discovered). You pay $12 USD per year for the more common TLDs (top-level domains), and pretty much every other extension under the sun is available for $20 all the way up to $120+. You do get WHOIS privacy bundled with the price of each domain, so that tends to make the service a bit more cost effective.

In terms of support, it’s typical Google. Sometimes it’s spot-on and your problem is solved ASAP, and others you’re sent through a Knowledge Base and Support Forum treasure hunt without a map. So yeah. Again, it’s what you’d expect.

Flippa

best place to purchase domain name

Flippa is not your average domain supplier. Not technically a registrar, but a marketplace (think eBay for website and domain names), Flippa lets you browse through thousands upon thousands of listings for domains that are for sale. Sometimes you can snag the perfect one from a squatter for pennies, and sometimes you can snag the perfect one from a squatter for thousands of dollars. It’s a crapshoot in the best kind of way.

The search function works like any other company: you type in keywords you want results for, and then you pick whether you want existing websites or domains (or apps or Shopify shops, technically).

They do tons of transactions every day, and their support has always been quick for me. The main downside to Flippa is that it’s not a pay-and-go service with set prices and rates. You’re dealing with other human beings, and we all know how that can be.

GoDaddy, Hostgator, and Bluehost

Okay, first of all, we know that these companies are not the same, but having used all of them for domain registration and cheap hosting, we’ve had nearly identical experiences with each and every one of them. Their prices and offerings are very, very similar, so I bundled them together.

To us, these are the big-box stores of domain registration, the Walmart, Target, and Costco. They have every last thing you need, are incredibly affordable and easy to work with, and when you have a problem, they’re happy to help (usually for an additional fee, depending on the extent to which you need them).

Things to Consider

With any registrar that offers discounted rates and major coupons, make sure you watch out for the renewal rate for successive years. If you have auto-renew on, at the end of that first year, you will be billed the “then-current” price, which has yet to be determined at your initial registration. Just because you paid $0.99 for that first year doesn’t mean that you won’t be paying $29.99 the next. Read the fine print.

Additionally, these kinds of registrars are more casual-user oriented, and therefore many of their services are tiered and priced with that market in mind. Features such as WHOIS privacy tend to be a la carte and higher-priced than at smaller, more niche-focused companies.

Customer support, in my experience at least, also tends to be similar. For both GoDaddy and Hostgator, I typically receive responses within a day, but the quality is hit-or-miss. (LiveChat tends to be more useful than email support lately.)

Clients and I both have been consistently upsold by both GoDaddy and Hostgator in the past to the tune of $75 USD for DNS issues and SSL certificate installation, all the way up to $300/hr a fix I handled in literally 3 minutes for a client after they were told the Hostgator technicians had to handle it over a couple of days.

My interactions with Bluehost customer service have been delightful, honestly, but neither I nor a client have needed anything as in-depth as with GoDaddy and Hostgator.

Admittedly, that’s all anecdotal, so if you plan on going with one of these three for domain registration, it’s personal preference.

GoDaddy

best place to purchase domain name

  • GoDaddy has WHOIS privacy in three tiers between $7.99 and $14.99 USD per year per domain
  • 19 TLD extensions available

Hostgator

best place to purchase domain name

Bluehost

best place to purchase domain name

  • Bluehost has WHOIS privacy for $0.99 per month per domain
  • 14 TLD extensions available

Name.com

best place to purchase domain name

Name.com has been around forever, and they are very well known in the domain industry. They have prices ranging anywhere from $3.99 USD per year to $100+, depending on how special you’re looking for. Name.com does offer sales, and their extension choices are far wider than many other hosts.

The WHOIS privacy option here is on the cheaper side at $4.99 USD per year, too. I would also like to mention that they do offer add-on email support–even if you don’t have a hosting plan through them. That’s a rare find, and I thought you’d wanna know about it.

These folks have built up a reputation on being reliable and consistent. If that’s what is important for you, you will find a lot to like here. They aren’t flashy, and they don’t have a gimmick. That’s pretty cool. They do what they set out to do, and they do it well.

DreamHost

best place to purchase a domain name

There are over 400 domain extensions, and very few places can sell them all. DreamHost is one of them. So if the desire for that ultra-specific, specialty domain keeps you up at night, DreamHost has you covered. They run sales where you can pick up some extensions as low as $0.99 USD; however, common domains run around $12-15.

DreamHost also boasts about its dedication to your privacy, and they show it by offering WHOIS protection free of charge. Additionally, they have put their money where their mouth is and fought back against a US Department of Justice warrant that requests “all information available to [DreamHost] about this website, its owner, and, more importantly, its visitors.” (Emphasis theirs).

Regardless of where you fall on the politics, if privacy is one of your major issues, DreamHost may be your new BFF.

1&1

best place to purchase domain name

And finally, 1&1 is a lesser-known company that has a pretty nifty gimmick: they offer special domain extensions (such as .mobi, .pizza, .ninja) at discounted prices. While they’re still more expensive than a common .com (.common? #domainpun), you should definitely check them out to see if you can snag your startup’s awesome .io URL cheaper here than you can elsewhere.

Like many other registrars, 1&1 offers hosting services as well as the not-so-common standalone email. Additionally, they have a pretty sweet Microsoft Office 365 deal for businesses. 1&1’s deal might make it cheaper and more accessible than G-suite, depending on your company and team. (Or if your company hates Google like my previous one did.)

Did I Miss the Best Place to Purchase a Domain Name?

This is by no means an exhaustive list of where you can register a domain. But I do think it’s a list of the best places for you to do so. So if you want ease of use, customer support, privacy protection, or just plain-and-simple discounts, hopefully one of these will work out for you.

Which company do you use for domain registration? Let us all know where and why in the comments so we have even more fantastic options to choose from!

Article thumbnail image by VectorsMarket / shutterstock.com

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94 Comments

  1. Please provide information on the best hosting sites for WordPress.

  2. GoDaddy is just great. 1. reliable 2. Good support 3. Cheap
    They also provide great discounts. What do you think?

  3. Thanks for the article and all the tips. I will check out some of these domain sellers for sure.
    I do hosting with InMotion and buy some domains from them which seem to be good in price. Some I buy from Enom as I have a reseller account others I buy from Netregistry as they had a lot of .au websites that I needed.
    As I do my own hosting I have never had any problems with any of these domain providers as there have been no real questions to ask. The hosting side of things seems to be more dicey to me rather than where you buy your name…. or have I just been lucky?

  4. Amazon Route 53 another option if you are using AWS and using AWS route 53 DNS service. It also works with AWS Lightsail account though you usually don’t get any discount or offers.

  5. The best for the domain is domaintyper.com. It shows you available domains as soon as you write the domain name (You don’t need to click the search button at all).
    For available domains, you can see the price from different registrar e.g. godaddy, UnitedDomains, etc.
    If offers other services for free, like “domain generator” and “Search on social network”

  6. Former domainer here. Godaddy , Uniregistry, Name,con, Namecheap, Dynadot. All good. I think That Uniregistry excels among them. Please take away 1&1 from the list as they are regarded as the worst ever.

  7. Want to sell a name..Sedos? Thoughts….

  8. I have been using Namebargain for years and only had the best service from them and the ease of use was always great.

  9. This is very helpful but just wondering if there is any benefit in keeping domain and hosting separate?

  10. I fell in love with Namecheap over 3 years ago. I haven’t regretted using them ever since. I left Godaddy because the upsells were excessive. Buy domain and hosting and in less than a week they say you need to upgrade. But with Namecheap, it’s been a bliss, they have their own downtimes just like anyone else but usually not something that’ll ever affect your work most of the time. Customer care is sweet, prices are respectably affordable (plus they use SSDs). The cheapest hosting plan can hold a very good number of visitors at a time. Hosting is good, premium DNS, email service. I love Namecheap and will recommend them anytime.

  11. The best and cheapest registrar depends on the TLD and even specific domain. And all the registrars constantly rotate promotions. I use tld-list.com to find the best place to register particular domains at any given time. Accordingly, I’ve used a bunch of registrars, but I don’t really interact with them after purchase as I self-host and use my own DNS provider.

  12. I use Hostmonster, coming from 1 & 1 was a nightmare for WordPress, I really like the Tech support at any step of the way they’re there for you.

  13. i use whois.com for my domain names, never lacked any of the above mentions.

    Everytime about support they are superb… Cheap too and very convenience to used buy domains and hosting.

    Im a godaddy customer too.

    Happy domaining!

  14. I have been buying domain names from Dreamhost since I started web design because every domain name comes with free Domain Privacy Protection. Hence, for each domain name you purchase, each year you only have to pay for the domain name fee without having to pay extra charge per domain for privacy protection. This is substantial savings for freelance web developers/designers, particularly when you have a lot of clients.

  15. Internet.bs and then move the dns to cloudflare. Works great.

  16. Sir, any suggestions for the beginners

  17. I so much love Namecheap and that’s because of these 2 major reasons

    1. Amazing Customer Support – Whenever i had issue or just wanted their help, Namecheap customer support are just one-click away

    2. Reliable Service – Their domain name product are reliable and one can be rest assured that your domain name would always be accessible

    There are other reasons though but these are the ones that really matters for now

  18. Namecheap.. because you cannot put a price on their excellent customer service ..
    I own 100s of domains with them

  19. I have 15+ domain names and all the domains I purchased from GoDaddy. When I have a plan to purchase a new domain, I just send an email to support member and he/she call-back to me. They have very good support services and help me purchase a new domain with discount.

    Not only they provide a discount to me on a new purchase even if I have a renewal, they also offer me a good discount.

  20. Kerrie

  21. i am an happy customer of globehost for purchasing domain and hosting, its easy to manage and use and best thing is u dont get spam messages after registering with them,unlike godaddy. if u register on godaddy and buy whois privacy then also u will get spam emails and sms,dats the reason i switched to globehost.

  22. I have transfered everything from GoDaddy to Google. Nothing but calls for up sales from GoDaddy after repeatedly asking them not to call.

    Godaddy domain auctions are joke. Apparently with godaddy’s Auction Service the highest bibber doesn’t win. I’ve been the highest bidder many times with no Reserve only not to receive my domain. It’s a complete joke.

  23. If I remember correctly I purchased my 1st domain from Godaddy. All my domains was based at Godaddy for a long while. I hosted some wordpress sites there as well. But I had a bad hosting experience with them. Ever since that time, my dislike for godaddy kept on growing. I finally gave up and moved all 30 domains to namecheap. I haven’t looked back since!

  24. Networksolutions the first registar

  25. These are all very typical answers to the domain registration question.

    Those that are in touch with cyberculture will likely know, Gandi.net, which values privacy and security above all, and became quite popular through its repeated virality on Reddit.

    It may not have Godaddy’s superbowl ads, but it is better.

  26. Hi, so much good info here, thanks. One question, do any of these (good) registrars offer reseller accounts?

  27. Launchaco is awesome! also has a free website builder (launchaco.com)

  28. I always use whois.com
    Great prices and no down sides that I’ve seen.

  29. I bought a domain name from appsoln.com
    These guys are new that’s why their prices are dry low.

  30. Hey, thanks for this. It was a timely reminder to tranfer my domains from GoDaddy. I chose Google, ended up saving $16/domain per year with privacy. ?? I was never happy with GoDaddy: the marketing phone calls, upselling/convoluted checkout process and tge steadily rising prices.

  31. First of all – I always recommend customers, friends etc to NEVER have your registration and webhotell the same place. If you ever have a major problem with your webhotell, they can not hold your site hostage. Just get a new webhotel and move the DNS pointer.

    Second – although rarely mentioned, the biggest Norwegian registrar, Domeneshop, has an international part in English – https://domainnameshop.com/ . The prices are ok, but more important, their control panel allows you to do everything you need without help from support. And if you need support, they are skilled and all speak English as you would expect.

    And no, I do not work for or with them 🙂 I am just a VERY satisfied customer. I have NEVER had any problem with their service as a registrar!

  32. Is there a reason you skipped Hover.com? It’s one of the best platforms. Seriously, it’s far superior to some of your recommendations here.

  33. We rely on namecheap, eventhough it took a little getting used to their back end. Love the 2 factor auth & the mobile app…

  34. I was surprised not to see SiteGround not included. OK, little pricey but great service.

    • Yes to SiteGround as well. Their range of services and prices are excellent, but their customer service is outstanding. I have used SiteGround for 12 years and never had a problem with them over anything. And they fix all my mistakes within hours if not minutes!

  35. I love Google for my emails (G Suite), calendars, and then… my domain names too 🙂

  36. Personally, i use one not mentioned, but around for a while. I have been with them over 15 years. http://Www.ipower.com and have had no problems with them to date. Their TLD list is on point and all other extensions is a huge list in itself. Hope that helps.

  37. You did miss the best: ‘domcomp.com’. It’s not a registrar themselves, but a price aggregator for many (if not most) of these sites.

    That said, other than Godaddy’s $1 .com coupons, porkbun has consistently had some of the lowest prices. Plus it’s not littered with mess like most other registrars. I still need to use NameCheap for SSL, and a few others for certain other domains (.am, things I need a proxy for), but over time many of my domains are moving to Porkbun.

  38. ace-host.net

    Premium quality, excel in support at an affordable price. Have been using their service for years and they have never let any of their services/my domains down.

    I must note that I will agree with “Haroun Kola” for the bad service I also had/have with GoDaddy, not 24/7 as they state and come not even close to either of my current prividers ace-host.net and inmotionhosting.com …

    • I agree with you: I left GoDaddy in a huff. I use InMotion Hosting now for domains and webhosting — truly excellent 24/7/365 customer support with friendly technicians answering live Chat in less than a minute or sometimes instantly, plus they have cPanel for all back-end work, and wonderful tutorials and videos on everything (you can even request a “how to” video and they will make one!).

  39. Thanks for this. For me there are a couple other considerations some readers may want to consider:

    1. I think your domain(s) should be registered with a different company than your site hosting company. Why? If your hosting company goes under (this has happened to me) you still have access to your domain name to quickly redirect to a new host. It also avoids a lot of the hassle if you change the host for a site. Stops a lot of the silly up-sell stuff you get with some registrars…GoDaddy.

    2. Make sure you own your domain. I see this all the time. A new client has broken ties with their previous site designer only to find out, usually when I tell them, that their previous designer who they are not on good terms with owns their domain. (I’ve seen designers threaten clients to keep the work using this as a hold on the account.) Register your own domains.

    3. And finally, this is only relevant to people like me buying country domains (like .ca), these should be bought from a registrar in that country. For example, if you buy a .ca domain from a US based company they actually have to buy it from a Canadian company and then resell it to you. Cut out the middleman. (Don’t know if this is the case with ever country.)

    Here in Canada my go to is 10dollar.ca, there pricing is great, and tech support on the one or two occasions I’ve needed it was good, but there are many good choices out there. All my registrations in one place, whois privacy included, re-direction is easy and not an extra. Avoid all the registrars that are nothing but upsell sites.

    Thanks again for the info.

    ernie

  40. accountsupport.com I’ve used them for 20 years without issue but I only use them for names. Super clean and simple, the adds or changes I make just happen and I have never had to call anyone. After having to deal with GoDaddy to “retrieve” a client’s site I thought my gosh what I use is like the “shell access” version of this nonsense…and I love it. Go-whatever you can keep it.

  41. Why did you not include Network Solutions, who was one of the originals?

    • I haven’t had any experience with them, and I don’t know anyone who has (which is a little odd to write out since, as you mentioned, they were one of the originals). To be honest, it slipped my mind. Got any experiences to share to make up for my oversight? 🙂

  42. I am a happy customer of bigrock.in

  43. I bought my 1st domain @ tucows (their name’s hover, today)
    in 1999
    It’s OK

  44. i have used Namecheap since 2003 after I moved all my domain from Godddy.

    Godaddy not only is constantly trying to upsell, but they have conditions in their TOS that can be quite costly.

    One condition is that if spam is reported that is from or contains your domain name, they will lock the domain and charge you $200 to reactivate it.

    Now I know it may sound like a good thing to crack down on spammers, but all it takes is a subscriber on a legitimate list to mark an email as spam rather than actually clicking to unsubscribe, or if you have an affiliate program your domain can be in affiliate lists that also can be reported by spam.

    Another thing to keep in mind is that there are registrars such a domainsatcost.ca that do not have the option to turn off automatic renewals. I moved all my ca domains from there as they were doing automatic renewals 1 month before expiry and you had to click do not renew to stop it (called cancel this domain), but then you did not have an option to renew come closer to the expiry date. This was a challenge when some domains may not want to be renewed. This was a few years ago so hopefully they have changed their policy.

    I have bought domains through Godaddy auctions, but I always move them. I own 100+ domains through Namecheap including some international such as .ca, .co.uk and one .us and I have never had an issue with their management.

    Just my two cents 😉

  45. I am surprised you did not mention Network Solutions. I have registered enough domains with them to receive a pretty decent discounted rate. Unfortunately, they have been raising their prices to me over the past few years, so I am starting to look around. Most of my interactions with their techs have been favorable, but have to admit there have been times when I received different answers (and prices) from different techs.

  46. I have used Hover for decade or longer without any problems.

  47. My vote is for Google Domains. Easiest to manage with the same Google account I use for everything else. And free privacy!

  48. Epik domains
    They sold me when they worked hard to fix a problem. Free Whois and a marketplace which I haven’t really tested. You can buy some domains as low as 1.99 or 4.99

  49. I hate GoDaddy. Miss a renewal and they gobble up your domain and want to sell it back to you for more — because they know you need it. Bully / Mob boss thing isn’t who I’d want to support.

    I use Porkbun. They’re cute: a small company out of Portland. Maybe that’s not for everyone, but for the needs of me, they’re great, and I’ve had great customer support experiences.

  50. DynaDot FTW. We’ve moved our 3 thousand+ domains from multiple registrars (most of those listed) and consolidated them with DD. Why? Protection. Bulk pricing is nice too, but the dirty secret of registrars is legal behind the scenes. Almost every one listed above will lock your domain(s) in an instant vs dealing with the cost of standing up to a non-binding lawyer letter. Godaddy is the #1 most unethical company we’ve ever used (as a registrar & VPS hosting), and they will turn your domain off immediately upon a simple letter of suggesting trademark or copyright infringement. All a lawyer has to do is suggest something is a conflict and many registrars will dump you in the cold, because who cares about $15? The top registrars will always say, “deal with the customer directly and get back to us after a court has ruled.” Corporate lawyers know this and will unethically attempt to control everything closely related to their clients’ trademarks simply because there is no resistance. Domains are the lifeblood of business marketing now. Do some research, and you’ll be appalled at the stories of startups & fully established companies losing their domains due to this injustice. This can cost a company millions, if not everything! Therefore each year we research registrars and their codes of conduct, and DynaDot has always stood out in this critical arena.

  51. Not sure if allowed but here is my link: https://www.namesilo.com/?rid=a58f539cr
    I switched from many years of using GoDaddy

    Namesilo.com
    8.99 .com 8.99 renewals
    Discount for bulk
    Free WHOIS privacy

    Has been very easy/simple to use.

  52. I hate GoDaddy so badly.

    • Add me to that list

      • Ditto. Moved all domains to Hover (mentioned above, but not spotlighted by author?).

  53. I am surprised that you do not list Dynadot and NameSilo. Dynadot has been a reliable registrar for a long time, and NameSilo offers very attractives prices for a number of TLDs (plus free Whois privacy).
    I agree about NameCheap: a good one, with a platform that is pleasant to use. Currently, I do not use them, since I consolidated my domain names elsewhere, but I keep an eye on them and I may transfer some of my domain names to them again some day.
    Otherwise, for people with a large number of domain names, Uniregistry might be worth considering. The prices are not the cheapest ones, but discounts can be negotiated, and management is easy.

  54. The nicest surprise from Google Domains is FREE PRIVATE REGISTRATION. No more domainproxy to have to deal with. 🙂

    • Yeah, that was a real kicker for me, too. While the prices are stable at a slightly higher cost, the ease of use with them makes me keep the “important” domains I own in there and use others for lesser ones.

  55. I use Trunames.com. All the usual services but .com domains are still $9.99 while others have been creeping up.

  56. love love Namecheap !
    great prices and support all the way around !

  57. If the domain name you’re looking for is not available, use https://domainr.com/ for alternatives.

    • Thanks for this tip 🙂

  58. I’ve switched all my names over to hover.com. They are amazing-interface is great, decent prices, referral program, and excellent customer service.

    • Ditto!

    • Same here – and Privacy is free/included!

  59. I’ve moved my 18 domains from GoDaddy to Google Domains and I couldn’t be happier. My main reason for leaving GoDaddy is because the owner kills elephants and other animals and I don’t want to support someone who does that. I was tired of all of their upselling and I was charged more for privacy than for the domain name, paying more than twice what Google Domains charge (privacy is included). I use privacy because most of my sites are genealogy family sites and I don’t want my personal information available, as BJ said. I find Google Domains much easier and faster to use.

    • Kills elephants? Disgusting!

      Does Google Domains now have a dashboard to view multiple domains in one account? I have a few domains through Google/Enom, but need to login to the account for each domain separately. That ruins Google for me.

      If Google Domains does have a dashboard, can names be consolidated into one account?

  60. easyname.com is an European Hoster (Austria). They are very reliable and run a very helpful support. I am with them since 2007.

  61. I have always used 000domains.com – which is now dotster.com. Have been happy with their service for years. They do not host any of my sites, but are the registrar for all of them.

  62. IWantMyName.com
    I think you hit the nail on the head when you say about customer service being a top priority and I’ve always found these guys to be excellent 🙂

  63. NameSilo. They have never disappointed and they have competitive prices. At 8.99 I get a domain with WHOIS Privacy.

    • I second the nomination for NameSilo. You can’t beat 8.99 WITH whois privacy. And it is very easy to manage multiple domains, handle dns changes, etc. They Rock!

    • That’s pretty awesome!

    • I 2nd NameSilo. Easy domain transfer, management, DNS updates, affordable, includes privacy…

  64. Hover has been fantastic for me. GoDaddy was nothing but upsell and nickel and dime to death.

    • Ditto

    • Seconded

    • That’s how I tend to feel about GoDaddy, too, but far more with the hosting options than domains (though it’s still there, too). It does have a pretty good selection, but I do get frustrated at the upsells

  65. I currently host my domains with hover.com, which is owned by Tucows. Maybe I listened to too many This Week in Tech podcasts in the day, but they have a nice, no-frills interface.

    • I like Hover, too, but use a variety of registrars. Hover does not have 24/7 customer service. On the other hand, I’ve never had one issue with a Hover domain name. The others – issues. My only concern with Hover is that the price for multiple email accounts. But, not having issues is valuable.

      The worst for issues is Bluehost. One can setup multiple emails for one fairly low cost at Bluehost. The worst part is their backup system. I pay for their backup service, but it has never, ever worked for me. Four for four strike outs.

      I plan to consolidate all domains at some registrar, someday.

    • I 2nd the motion for Hover.com. They also offer email service. Fantastic customer support if you happen to need it.

    • It’s not no frills. It’s exactly what you want. They don’t have a bunch of upsell/cross sell crap, because it’s all included for free. And real, humans (in America) answer the phones that know how to help in the event you need to call in!

  66. GoDaddy

  67. Good guidance. Thanks.

    It’s important that your domain registrar be available 24/7 for support – by phone. When something goes wrong, and you need help (it rarely does once set-up, but…) you’ll want phone support.

    I am moving over to Google Domains. Go Daddy and most of the others, but particularly Go Daddy, tries to up-sell you 100 things when you check out. I also believe a lot of their marketing is misleading to a novice. They really take advantage of people who aren’t very technically savvy –
    in my opinion. And unless you’re running from the law, you probably don’t need Private Domain registration.

    • The main reason I go for Private Domain registration is to keep my address and information out of the public eye. You can look at WHOIS and find anyone’s home address (if that’s where they registered it, and many individuals do). I never cared until a pseudo-creepy student looked at me one day and said, “You live at [my old address]. I looked up your website. Now I know where you live.” I started using private registry since then.

  68. Been using internetbs.net for years, typically have the best prices and offer free private whois.

  69. I used to always use Name.com, but these days I’ve switched over to Uniregistry.com. I’m a very happy customer!

    • NameSilo

      • internet.bs, porkbun, namesilo, namecheap

    • Oh cool! I haven’t ever tried them, but I will next time I’m looking around to compare!

      • I use a combo of Google Domains and Uniregistry, very impressed with Uniregistry.

  70. Uniregistery & NameCheap.. but Namecheap do have the best customer support in market… hands down

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