.nagoya Domain: A Japanese City Ending With No Link Test
.nagoya entered the root zone on 16 January 2014 under an ICANN registry agreement dated 24 October 2013, and the contracting party is GMO Registry, Inc. of Tokyo. The registry describes it as a geographic extension for the Japanese city of Nagoya, intended to promote the city and let citizens, businesses and community groups tie their identity to its brand. As of 12 August 2026 there are 3,647 registrations, 3,207 of them published.
City businesses, restaurants, tourism and event projects, clubs, local media and brands addressing the city all register here. General availability opened on 23 June 2014. Try candidates on the .nagoya domain search screen, and see the .kyoto page for the same registry's restricted city extension.
The Registration Policy for this ending says it in terms: any natural person or entity is eligible to register. The registry gives its reasoning too — broad registration and use is itself essential to the goal of promoting the city as a brand. By contrast, the Kyoto extension run by the same operator requires a valid physical address in that prefecture at the moment of registration, and refuses the application where the condition is not met. So the fact that one operator imposes a link test on one city extension tells you nothing about the next. Read each extension's own policy when you compare them.
.NAGOYA Domain at a Glance
- Registry operator GMO Registry, Inc. (Tokyo)
- Root zone entry 16 January 2014
- Eligibility None; the policy treats everyone as eligible
- Zone size 3,647 registrations, 3,207 published (12 August 2026)
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .nagoya domain
- Character Length 3 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.nagoya 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
$21.90 /year -
Transfer
$21.99 /year -
Renewal
$24.19 /year -
Restore
$84.90 -
Late Renewal
$4.84
Included With Every .nagoya 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.
.nagoya Domain Lifecycle
What happens day by day after it expires
Day 0 is the domain's expiry dateIn short: your .nagoya 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 .nagoya 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 .nagoya 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 $4.84 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 .nagoya 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
.nagoya Domain Specifications and Registration Rules
Registration conditions, supported features and the registry's own timelines in a single table.
.nagoya Domain Registration
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .nagoya domain
- Character Length 3 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.nagoya Domain Support
- IDN Support Yes
- Transfer Support Yes
- Late Renewal Support Yes
Frequently Asked Questions About .nagoya Domains
The questions people actually ask before registering — answered plainly.
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Yes. The Registration Policy states in one sentence that any natural person or entity is eligible; there is no city link, address or activity requirement. The registry sets out its reasoning as well: broad use serves the goal of promoting the city as a brand. Check whether a name is free on the .nagoya search page.
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The Registration Policy sets a minimum of three characters and a maximum of 63. A name may not begin or end with a hyphen, may not carry hyphens in both the third and fourth positions, and underscores are not permitted. That three-character floor is specific to this zone; in many newer extensions single-character names are technically possible.
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The registry publishes a Japanese character table for internationalised domain names and evaluates them against the IDNA2008 rules. Which spellings are open in practice is reported by your registrar during the availability check. If you take an internationalised name, register the Latin-script equivalent beside it; to test both forms together, use the bulk domain search screen.
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The registry retired its legacy port 43 lookup service on 1 May 2026 under ICANN's transition policy, and registration data is now served over the newer protocol. In practice your registrar's lookup screen, or ours, handles that change on your behalf. Run the query from the whois search page.
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Yes, the extension follows gTLD transfer rules. Obtain the authorisation code, lift the transfer lock and start the request at the new provider. Since the choice of registrars carrying Japanese extensions can be narrow, confirm in advance that the gaining registrar supports this ending. Run it from the domain transfer page.
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City sites concentrate their traffic around local working hours, and most visitors arrive on a phone. Image sizes, cache configuration and deferring heavy components such as maps therefore make far more difference than raw server power. Do not skip the certificate: compare options on the SSL certificate page and environments on the hosting page.
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