The .directory Domain: Listings, Guides and Registers
.directory was recorded in the root zone on 13 November 2013, and the IANA entry names Binky Moon, LLC as the sponsoring organisation. The nTLDstats page accessed on 11 August 2026 shows 22,669 registrations, of which 14,936 appear in the zone file — a publication rate near 66%, at the lower end of this group.
Professional registers, business listings, event calendars and supplier lists for a single trade all sit comfortably here. The worth of a directory lies in the accuracy of its entries rather than their number, which gives a plain rule: never list a field you cannot keep updated. Shortlist your candidates through a domain name search.
Roughly a third of the names here are absent from the zone file: of 22,669 registrations, 14,936 are live. Directory labels are often bought for a plan that never starts. Read that both ways. A directory named after an industry survives only if somebody maintains it, so decide where the data comes from, and how often it is refreshed, before you publish anything.
.DIRECTORY Domain at a Glance
- Sponsoring organisation Binky Moon, LLC
- Root zone record 13 November 2013
- Eligibility condition No verified restriction
- Registered names 22,669 (nTLDstats, 11 August 2026)
- Present in the zone file 14,936 names, about 66%
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .directory domain
- Character Length 1 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.directory 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
$6.49 /year -
Transfer
$27.29 /year -
Renewal
$29.39 /year -
Restore
$114.90 -
Late Renewal
$4.39
Included With Every .directory 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.
.directory Domain Lifecycle
What happens day by day after it expires
Day 0 is the domain's expiry dateIn short: your .directory 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 .directory 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 .directory 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 $4.39 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 .directory 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
.directory Domain Specifications and Registration Rules
Registration conditions, supported features and the registry's own timelines in a single table.
.directory Domain Registration
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .directory domain
- Character Length 1 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.directory Domain Support
- IDN Support No
- Transfer Support Yes
- Late Renewal Support Yes
Frequently Asked Questions About .directory Domains
The questions people actually ask before registering — answered plainly.
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Anyone may; no publishing or data-processing credential is asked for.
Binky Moon, LLC requires neither a company record nor an undertaking about content. A professional body and a one-person blog register on the same terms. Suitable labels can be tried in a domain name search.
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State where each field came from and how an entry can be removed.
Lists carrying names, phone numbers and addresses fall under data protection rules in many countries, so a visible route for removal requests is needed. Naming the source also makes a wrong entry easier to trace. Secure the form pages with an SSL certificate.
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Of 22,669 registrations, 14,936 are live — roughly 66%.
The figures come from the nTLDstats page accessed on 11 August 2026. The missing third shows how often directory labels are bought for later and simply held. For you that raises the odds that the industry term you have in mind is still free.
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Put the trade or the city in the label and narrow the scope there.
A generic label like guide is both taken and silent about what you list. Trade joined to city answers a search directly and still fits once the directory grows. Considering several cities, run them together in a bulk domain name search.
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Decide on a refresh schedule before the site goes live.
A directory listing businesses that have closed misleads a visitor once, and they rarely come back. A workable method is to show the date each entry was last verified: it informs the reader and keeps you to a routine. The source list belongs on the same page.
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Ask your current registrar for the authorisation code.
Directories live on search traffic, so an outage can leave a mark on rankings; prepare the name servers first and move during a quiet window. The domain must be unlocked and at least sixty days past registration. Check it with a whois search, then continue at domain transfer.
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