The .help Domain: A Home Address for Your Support Desk
.help entered the root zone on 15 August 2014; its ICANN registry agreement is dated 26 June 2014 and the current contracting party is Innovation Service Ltd, registered in the Seychelles. The nTLDstats page accessed on 12 August 2026 shows 294,795 registrations, of which 195,914 appear in the zone file.
Four letters say what the site does, which is why help centres, technical support portals, product documentation and assistance lines gather here. No eligibility condition applies. Try candidates through a .help domain search, and compare the explanatory alternative on the .guide page.
The sponsoring organisation in the IANA root zone record was updated on 4 January 2024 and now reads Innovation Service Ltd; ICANN's registry agreement page names the same party. The registry's own website, meanwhile, still carries the pre-transfer brand, and the ending is marketed inside a different portfolio altogether. None of that is contradictory — the contracting party, the commercial operation and the technical back end can be three different companies. When you want to know who actually runs an ending, read the IANA record rather than the marketing page.
.HELP Domain at a Glance
- Sponsoring organisation Innovation Service Ltd
- IANA record updated 4 January 2024
- ICANN registry agreement 26 June 2014
- Root zone record 15 August 2014
- Registered names 294,795 (nTLDstats, 12 August 2026)
- Present in the zone file 195,914 names, about 66%
- Document Requirement There are no requirements for buying .help domain registration
- Character Length 1 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.help 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
$3.99 / years -
Transfer
$28.59 / years -
Renewal
$30.79 / years -
Restore
$104.90 -
Late Renewal
$5.72
Included With Every .help 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.
.help Domain Lifecycle
Domain lifecycle
The stages in order, from registration to releaseDomain Is Available (Available)
A .help 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 yours for the term you chose. You can renew at any point before expiry to keep it uninterrupted, 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.
Pending Delete Period (Pending Delete Period)
If the redemption window is missed too, the domain enters the final stage and waits to be deleted. Renewal and recovery are no longer possible here; when the period ends the registration is removed for good.
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.
.help Domain Specifications and Registration Rules
Registration conditions, supported features and the registry's own timelines in a single table.
.help Domain Registration
- Document Requirement There are no requirements for buying .help domain registration
- Character Length 1 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.help Domain Support
- IDN Support Yes
- Transfer Support Yes
- Late Renewal Support Yes
.help Domain Registration Periods
- Registration Periods 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 years
- Renewal Periods 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 years
- Pre-registration 1 days
- Accounting Period 45 days
- Finalization Period 1 days
- Failure Period 45 days
- Payment Period 45 days
- Redemption Period 30 days
- Deletion Hold Period 30 days
- Renewal Time 30 Day
Frequently Asked Questions About .help Domains
The questions people actually ask before registering — answered plainly.
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A separate address suits a support team that stands on its own; a sub-domain suits documentation tied to the product.
A sub-domain shares cookies, sessions and the certificate with your main domain, so a signed-in user is not asked to authenticate twice. A separate address reads short over the phone and in print. In multi-brand groups, one support address with a folder per brand is a common compromise.
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There are 294,795 registrations and 195,914 appear in the zone file — about 66%.
This is the largest zone among its neighbours, yet one name in three has never gone live. Single-word roots will therefore look taken without necessarily having a site behind them. Build candidates on a brand-plus-support pattern and test them together through the bulk domain name search.
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Titles that name the problem in the user's words, and one task per article.
Headings written in internal terminology never surface in search, because visitors type the symptom rather than the name of a product module. Number the steps, date the screenshots, and leave a contact route at the end of each article for the people it did not solve.
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It does — a short address travels well on posters, on cards and when spoken aloud.
On an address like that, accessibility is the job rather than a technical detail: the page has to open on a slow connection, the text has to work with a screen reader, and the phone number has to be a tappable link. You can compare server-side options on the hosting page.
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Yes. It runs on an authorisation code and the registry asks for no extra documents.
The risk with a support address is visibility: during any interruption, users cannot reach the very page they went looking for. Schedule the move for the hours when ticket volume is lowest, and keep your status page on a separate address beforehand. You can start from the domain transfer page.
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