The UK namespace has stopped growing for a long time now...

[Edwin]

Thought it would be interesting to provide Nominet's stats in a single chart to kick off the year in domaining. Basic take-aways:

1) UK namespace growth has completely stalled. Basically no change for over a year.

2) .uk take-up has also stalled (and is even dropping a fraction)

 

[martin-s]

Do you have any stats to show when the 3rd level registrations started shrinking? Or which extension the 4.1% of lost registrations are coming from? (.co.uk, .org.uk, .me.uk, etc.)

I'm actually slightly impressed by the growth of .uk registration numbers. Maybe it isn't quite a dead horse yet.

 

[Edwin]

No, sorry. I took all of Nominet's public data already.

 

[DomainManage]

I think we're on the precipice of an extremely transitional time in the domain industry as a whole. Distinct paths have arisen in the usage of domains now. I don't think anything will ever be near 2000 to 2010 in classic domaining terms. Nevertheless I have been sensing social media's grip declining. I think the fact the registry is nowhere near dipping below 10million during all this time is comforting. Realistically speaking, how big is it ever going to get - 65mil?? with everyone owning a domain compared to .de and their population, don't we do ok.

 

[Skinner]

I already commented on this a few times on here and speculated this were the reason behind the price increase to "simulate" growth. I also emailed nominet for more detailed figures, nothing forthcoming.

 

[Edwin]

You can see the effect of that price rise first hand - the anemic but steady growth in the total number of domains goes into reverse as soon as the new pricing comes in.

Of course, as has been well documented, Nominet are still (millions of) quids in despite the decline, but they've sacrificed growth for loadsamoney.

 

[Edwin]

The shrinkage continues. The last figures available from Nominet are for December 2016. They show that the total size of the namespace is just 10,592,882.

I expect the numbers to keep falling, almost certainly accelerating as we get towards the .uk deadline and millions of domains get dropped because it's not cost-effective to register the matching .uk across bulk portfolios. Plus the full effects of the price rise should filter through (since most domains were renewed on a 2 year cycle, there are plenty that won't yet have come up for renewal since the price changed)

The golden goose is dying the death of a thousand cuts. Nominet, you only had one job...

 

[RobM]

Yes but they all have nice houses, cars, and no doubt brimming offshore accounts. They don't care in the slightest about how they achieve their ends. When they have ruined this they can always move into another industry.

 

[dee]

I expect the numbers to keep falling, almost certainly accelerating as we get towards the .uk deadline and millions of domains get dropped because it's not cost-effective to register the matching .uk across bulk portfolios. Plus the full effects of the price rise should filter through (since most domains were renewed on a 2 year cycle, there are plenty that won't yet have come up for renewal since the price changed)

The golden goose is dying the death of a thousand cuts. Nominet, you only had one job...

Maybe a stupid question.... but why does the co.uk have be dropped when deadline approaches. Surely all that happens is the uk becomes free to reg ? The co uk owner doesnt have to reg it.