.com.by Domain: the Commercial Sub-Zone of Belarus
com.by is the commercial zone beneath Belarus's country extension .by and has long been one of the address forms businesses in the country prefer. Structurally it differs from .by in one important respect: although the national namespace is administered by the Operational and Analytical Centre under the President, com.by itself is held by a private company. The registry record shows the zone as a name belonging to the Minsk-based company Otkryty Kontakt, and that company states plainly in its own contract that it is the administrator of the second-level domain.
Eligibility is broad. Clause 2.5 of the operator's published contract defines the customer as a natural person, a legal entity or a sole trader, and imposes no residency, local address or trustee requirement. Once the registration is entered into the national database you become the administrator of the name. If you would rather have the second level itself, .by is also open to applicants abroad and takes its rules from the central instruction.
Documents are not required upfront, but the contract reserves the right to ask and sets a short clock: originals or duly certified copies must be produced within three days of the request, and a company abroad may be asked for an extract from the commercial register of its country of incorporation or equivalent proof of legal status. If payment is missed the name is removed from the register, yet the operator keeps a 30 calendar day priority right for you to take the same name again. Check the status of your name on the domain name search page.
.COM.BY Domain at a Glance
- Zone operator Otkryty Kontakt (Minsk); a private company, not the registry
- Legal nature of the zone A privately held second-level name registered under .by
- Governing rules Chapter 10 of the OAC instruction, devoted to the third level
- National zone administrator Operational and Analytical Centre under the President
- Document deadline Produced within three days of a request
- If payment is missed A 30 calendar day priority right to re-register stays with the holder
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .com.by domain
- Country Belarus
- Character Length 3 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.com.by Domain Prices — No Surprise Fees
Registration, transfer and renewal fees are listed separately. The renewal price can differ from the first-year price, so you see both up front.
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New Registration
$49.00 /year -
Transfer
$49.00 /year -
Renewal
$53.90 /year -
Trustee Service
$1.00
Included With Every .com.by Domain
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Free DNS management
Change A, MX, TXT and CNAME records yourself from the panel — no waiting on anyone when you move a site or mailbox.
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Domain forwarding
Point the domain at your existing site, a campaign page or a social profile — at no extra cost.
.com.by Domain Lifecycle
What happens day by day after it expires
Day 0 is the domain's expiry dateIn short: for .com.by the post-expiry timeline is set by the registry, so it differs from one extension to the next. The diagram below shows the windows that actually apply to .com.by, day by day. One thing never changes, whichever extension you hold: renewing before the expiry date is always the cheapest and safest route.
Domain Is Available (Available)
A .com.by address at this stage has not been taken yet, and it goes to whoever registers first. Check the name you have in mind — if it is free, it can be yours within minutes.
Domain Is Active (Active Period)
Once registration is complete, the domain is registered to you for the term you selected. You can renew at any point before it expires to keep it active, or switch on auto-renewal so you never have to watch the date.
Redemption Period (Redemption Period)
The domain is not released the moment it expires — during this window it is still yours and can be recovered. Some extensions charge an extra restore fee at this stage, so renewing before expiry is always the cheaper route.
Domain Is Available Again
Once deletion completes, the domain leaves the system and anyone can register it — popular names are often taken the same minute by someone watching. Keep auto-renewal on so a name you care about never gets this far.
.com.by Domain Specifications and Registration Rules
Registration conditions, supported features and the registry's own timelines in a single table.
.com.by Domain Registration
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .com.by domain
- Country Belarus
- Character Length 3 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.com.by Domain Support
- IDN Support No
- Transfer Support Yes
- Late Renewal Support No
Trustee Requirement for .com.by Domains
Frequently Asked Questions About .com.by Domains
The questions people actually ask before registering — answered plainly.
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By a private company. The national namespace is administered by the Operational and Analytical Centre under the President, but com.by itself is an ordinary second-level name registered under .by, and the registry record shows it as belonging to the Minsk company Otkryty Kontakt. The company says the same in clause 2.6 of its own published contract: the service provider is the administrator of the second-level domain. The zone is not unregulated, though — chapter 10 of the central instruction governs third-level registrations under a separate regime.
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The governing rule sets a ceiling. Article 66 of the central instruction states that the term of a lower-level domain registration may not exceed the term of the corresponding higher-level registration. So the term of a name under com.by is capped by the expiry of com.by's own registration. The operator defines its service in two items — ensuring the functioning of the lower-level domain and extending that period — and ties the fee to its own tariff without publishing a fixed number of years. Confirm the term when you order.
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Yes. Clause 2.5 of the operator's published contract defines the customer as a natural person, a legal entity or a sole trader, and the text contains no residency, Belarusian address, local representative or trustee requirement. Article 62 of the central instruction likewise says the holder of a lower-level domain may be an applicant who has concluded a contract with the second-level holder. In practice your counterparty is not an accredited registrar but the company that operates the zone; it passes the application to the registrar.
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Yes, the contract lists four routes separately: an assignment contract for the rights, a court decision, inheritance, and succession when a legal entity is reorganised. On assignment the transferor files an application and the transferee files an acceptance stating the contract's date, number and signatories. One restriction matters: on transfer, the new contract runs only for the remaining term of the previous holder's contract, so the clock does not restart. You can plan the operation from the domain transfer page.
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Partly. Clause 4.5.1 of the operator's contract says two things: if the extension fee is not paid before the contract expires, the lower-level domain is removed from the register; but the operator preserves a 30 calendar day priority right for the customer to register the same name again. The name therefore goes offline, yet for thirty days it does not pass to anyone else. Direct .by has no such window: there a missed due date annuls the registration outright.
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None are required at registration, but the contract reserves the right to ask. Clause 4.5.2 gives the operator the power to demand documents confirming the accuracy of the information supplied in the application; clause 4.6.5 obliges the customer to produce originals or duly certified copies within three days of the request. That means an identity document for individuals and sole traders, state registration documents for legal entities, and where necessary an extract from the commercial register of the country of incorporation or equivalent proof of legal status.
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