AskMeAnything
Ask
Ask
27
@filing_cabinet ·

Spaceship codes: .xyz costs more than .com over 5 years

Ran the codes showing on Spaceship on 23 August 2026 against the renewal prices, because the first year is the number they put in front of you and the renewal is the number you pay four more times.

code TLD 1st year renews at 5 years
SPSR86 .top $0.98 $4.05 $17.18
COM67 .com $3.60 $10.18 $44.32
NET19 .net $4.78 $11.40 $50.38
XYZ52 .xyz $0.75 $12.72 $51.63
IO85 .io $14.98 $38.88 $170.50

Three more I could not price cleanly: DOM80 and SPST25 move with the TLD, and SPSCOMTR takes a .com transfer to roughly $3.94.

The result worth keeping is in the last two columns. .xyz is the cheapest first year on the list and the second dearest over five years. It starts 4.8 times below .com and finishes $7.31 above it, because the code is cutting 17 times off a renewal rather than the 2.8 times .com gets cut.

The genuinely cheap one is .top, and it is cheap for the boring reason: the renewal is $4.05 rather than the discount being large.

Caveats, because they matter here. First year figures are what my own cart showed, renewals came from a public price tracker, the two disagreed on .top ($0.98 against $1.18), and every code on this list expires.

7 answers Share
Report

7 answers

BestTopNewOldControversial

Answering anonymously, a moderator will review it first.

  • @three_tabs_open · last wk. · 2 replies
    @three_tabs_open ·

    The other half of why the cheap first year works as a business is that almost nobody moves.

    Transferring is not hard but it is sixty days of not being allowed to, an auth code, and a nagging feeling you will break your email. So the $0.75 buys a customer who will pay $12.72 a year for a decade out of mild inconvenience.

    20
    Share
    Reply

    Answering anonymously, a moderator will review it first.

    Report
    • @by_the_window · last wk.
      @by_the_window ·

      I have moved exactly one domain in nine years and it was because the registrar folded.

      12
      Share
      Reply

      Answering anonymously, a moderator will review it first.

      Report
  • @two_screens · last wk. · 2 replies
    @two_screens ·

    The lever this table implies and does not say out loud: if the renewal is the real price, buy the years up front at registration.

    Most registrars let you take up to ten at once and you pay today's renewal rate for all of them. On a .xyz that is the difference between locking $12.72 and finding out what it is in 2031, which is not a number anybody can tell you.

    24
    Share
    Reply

    Answering anonymously, a moderator will review it first.

    Report
    • @filing_cabinet · last wk.
      @filing_cabinet OP ·

      Good point and worth a caveat of its own. That locks the price you were quoted, it does not lock the registrar, and a TLD operator raising wholesale has historically flowed through to everyone eventually.

      15
      Share
      Reply

      Answering anonymously, a moderator will review it first.

      Report
  • @cold_toast · last wk. · 2 replies
    @cold_toast ·

    Pushing back a bit, because the five year column assumes you keep it five years.

    Most of what I register never sees a second year. For a weekend build that needs a name for a demo link, $0.75 is exactly right and the renewal is somebody else's problem, mine specifically, and I just let it drop.

    18
    Share
    Reply

    Answering anonymously, a moderator will review it first.

    Report
    • @nth_rewrite · last wk.
      @nth_rewrite ·

      That works right up until one of them turns into the thing you actually keep. Then you are on the expensive renewal on the worst TLD, and renaming later costs more than the domain ever did.

      1
      Share
      Reply

      Answering anonymously, a moderator will review it first.

      Report
  • @late_invoice · last wk.
    @late_invoice ·

    .io is the real outlier and it barely gets mentioned because everyone is looking at the multiples. $170 over five years for one name, and it is the default choice for anything technical almost by reflex.

    1
    Share
    Reply

    Answering anonymously, a moderator will review it first.

    Report