.date Domains: Calendar or Courtship, the Root Decides
.date entered the root zone on 5 February 2015, and the IANA record names dot Date Limited as the sponsoring organisation — a separate legal entity sitting in the same portfolio as dot Cricket Limited, which runs .cricket. The nTLDstats page accessed on 11 August 2026 shows 15,911 names in the zone, of which 9,450 appear in the zone file.
In English 'date' means two things: a day in the calendar and two people meeting. That doubling is the ending's strength and its trap. So the rule reads — where your root does not settle the meaning by itself, the visitor cannot tell which side you are on. Building an events calendar, put the date in the root; working on the introductions side, lead with the person or the interest. Read candidates aloud while testing them in a domain name search.
In this zone the address alone does not say what you do: the same ending can carry a conference calendar and an introductions project equally well. To leave the visitor in no doubt, the root has to fix the direction firmly. On the events side, let the root name the event, the city or the year; on the introductions side, state the audience or the interest in the root. That ambiguity does not exist in .dating, where the address describes only the introductions service and the subject settles itself.
.DATE Domain at a Glance
- Sponsoring organisation dot Date Limited
- Root zone record 5 February 2015
- Eligibility condition No verified restriction
- Registered names 15,911 (nTLDstats, 11 August 2026)
- Published 9,450 names (about three in five)
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .date domain
- Character Length 1 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.date 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
$29.99 /year -
Transfer
$29.99 /year -
Renewal
$34.99 /year -
Restore
$119.90 -
Late Renewal
$7.00
Included With Every .date 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 lock
While the lock is on, nobody can move your domain to another registrar without your approval.
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Domain forwarding
Point the domain at your existing site, a campaign page or a social profile — at no extra cost.
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Free WHOIS privacy
Your name, address and phone stay out of public WHOIS records, which cuts down spam and scam calls.
.date Domain Lifecycle
What happens day by day after it expires
Day 0 is the domain's expiry dateIn short: your .date domain is put on Client Hold on its expiry date, so the site and e-mail stop that same day. You can still renew during the first 20 days, but from this point a late renewal fee is added on top of the renewal price. On day 20 the registration is deleted and until day 50 only a paid restore brings it back. Nothing at all can be done in the 5 days that follow, and on day 55 the name is open to anyone. There is exactly one way never to enter this chain: keep auto-renewal on.
Domain Is Available (Available)
A .date 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.
Renewal Window (Client Hold)
On its expiry date your .date domain is put on Client Hold: the site and e-mail go down that day, but the registration is still yours. A single renewal within these first 20 days brings everything back exactly as it was — nothing is lost. The only difference is that a $7.00 late renewal fee is now added to the renewal price; renewing before the expiry date avoids that fee entirely.
Redemption Period (Redemption / RGP)
On day 20 the registration is deleted and the 30-day redemption period that ICANN requires of every gTLD registry begins. The name is not released to anyone during this time; only you can take it back, by paying the restore fee, until day 50. That fee is far higher than a renewal — renewing on time is always the cheaper route.
Pending Delete (Pending Delete)
Once the redemption window closes too, the domain enters its final 5 days and there is no way back. Neither renewal nor restore works here; nobody — your registrar included — can return the name to you. The registry uses this window as the last hold before the name goes back into the pool.
Open to Anyone Again (Released)
On day 55 the name .date returns to the pool and anyone can register it. Sought-after names are often gone within seconds, and there is no guaranteed way to get one back. Yet staying out of this timeline is entirely in your hands: leave auto-renewal on and the expiry date will never catch you off guard.
The timeline above is the schedule Atak Domain applies and publishes. The ICANN chart you will find elsewhere shows a renewal window of up to 45 days after expiry; ICANN's policy on expired registrations (section 2.2.1) lets registrars delete an expired domain at any time, provided they disclose their policy in advance. We apply that window as 20 days and publish it here in plain sight. Full text of the policy: ICANN Expired Registration Recovery Policy
.date Domain Specifications and Registration Rules
Registration conditions, supported features and the registry's own timelines in a single table.
.date Domain Registration
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .date domain
- Character Length 1 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.date Domain Support
- IDN Support No
- Transfer Support Yes
- Late Renewal Support Yes
Frequently Asked Questions About .date Domains
The questions people actually ask before registering — answered plainly.
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It is used for introductions and for calendars alike; the root draws the line.
Because the English word carries two meanings, the zone is open to two quite different uses. To keep visitors from guessing, let the root state plainly which side you are on. To see whether the root you want is free, run a domain name search.
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Take .date if you can live with ambiguity, and .dating if you want clarity.
.dating describes only the introductions service; the address settles the subject on its own and needs no explanation in an advert. .date is broader and can just as easily carry an events calendar. Details sit on the .dating domain page.
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There are 15,911 registrations, of which 9,450 appear in the zone file.
The figures come from the nTLDstats page accessed on 11 August 2026. A publication rate of three in five suggests a fair share of names have yet to become projects. To see who holds a name you like, run a whois search.
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It does — the ending carries the calendar meaning directly and the address stays short.
For events that recur each year, keeping the event's name rather than the year in the root lasts far longer; handle the year in the page structure instead. Pages with registration and ticket forms process personal data, so an encrypted connection is needed; see the SSL certificate page.
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State your age limit, your verification method and the route for complaints.
On the introductions side, making the way users reach one another and the blocking tools visible is a basic duty of care. Those obligations arise from the service you run; no such supervision is defined on the registry side. Keep your rules readable before the sign-up step rather than after it.
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Begin by getting the authorisation code from your current registrar.
The transfer lock must be open, sixty days must have passed since registration, and the administrative email receiving the approval link has to work. Event sites get busier as the date approaches, so plan the move for a quiet period, then continue on the domain transfer page.
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