Domain investor and analyst Bob Hawkes posted on the professional forum NamePros an interesting overview of the dynamics of name transactions in three gTLDs — .COM, .NET, .XYZ — and the country codes of the British Indian Ocean Territory .IO and Anguilla .AI. Using data from NameBio, he compared the volume of name transactions in these domain zones in the first three months with their figures for the same period last year and with the average data of three months over the past three years. In this case, only transactions worth a thousand dollars and more were taken into account.
As you might guess, the best dynamics were demonstrated by the .AI, which is experiencing a boom in popularity due to the huge public interest in AI technologies. Here, the volume of transactions over the past three months was 57.9% higher than in the same period last year, and more than 280% higher compared to the average of the previous three years.
With its meteoric rise, .AI has dethroned .IO as the most popular domain extension among tech companies. However, things are looking good for her too. Here, the results for the first three months of 2024 are 32.8% better than the three-year average and 40.4% better than last year, which was obviously the most challenging year for the domain. The new gTLD .XYZ also dropped last year. But now he is actively catching up: here, three months of this year brought a volume of transactions 16% greater than the average of the three previous years - and almost twice as much as last year.
As for “old” domains, .NET showed an increase, albeit small, in transaction volumes compared to both last year and the three-year average – 20.5% and 11.6%, respectively. But the most popular .COM, although it gained slightly from its last year’s indicators, was 16.7% behind the average indicators of the last three years. However, it should be recalled that we are talking about the relative performance of domain zones in relation to their own results. If we take absolute numbers, then the .COM, of course, exceeds any other in terms of transaction volume by at least 10 times.
