.swiss Domain: The Extension Whose Registry Is a State
The .swiss registry agreement is dated 16 October 2014 and the zone entered the root on 16 April 2015. The operator is the Federal Office of Communications acting for the Swiss Confederation, which means the contracting party is not a company but a government office. The agreement is classified as a community extension.
This is a wholly different regime from extensions that merely evoke a country without restricting anyone. Registration is open to Swiss public bodies, entities on the Swiss commercial register, associations and foundations headquartered in Switzerland, natural persons domiciled there and Swiss nationals. Before you assess your own eligibility, check whether the name is free on the .swiss domain search page.
Registration in this zone is not a quiet transaction. The operator publishes a list of incoming applications; if no competing application or comment arrives, the name is assigned in principle within three days after a twenty-day window. Applications from natural persons must carry the applicant's own social insurance number and address, and every registrant is required to maintain an administrative contact inside Switzerland. A two-stage appeal route exists against every administrative decision taken.
.SWISS Domain at a Glance
- Registry operator Swiss Confederation — Federal Office of Communications (OFCOM)
- Root zone entry 16 April 2015
- Eligibility Required; a real presence in Switzerland and an objective link to the name
- Allocation procedure Applications published and open to objection for 20 days
- Zone size 24,763 registrations, 22,819 published (13 August 2026)
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .swiss domain
- Character Length 3 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.swiss 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
$573.79 /year -
Transfer
$597.70 /year -
Renewal
$597.70 /year -
Restore
$333.34 -
Late Renewal
$35.20
Included With Every .swiss 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.
.swiss Domain Lifecycle
What happens day by day after it expires
Day 0 is the domain's expiry dateIn short: your .swiss 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 .swiss 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 .swiss 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 $35.20 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 .swiss 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
.swiss Domain Specifications and Registration Rules
Registration conditions, supported features and the registry's own timelines in a single table.
.swiss Domain Registration
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .swiss domain
- Character Length 3 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.swiss Domain Support
- IDN Support Yes
- Transfer Support Yes
- Late Renewal Support Yes
Frequently Asked Questions About .swiss Domains
The questions people actually ask before registering — answered plainly.
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As a rule it cannot. The community section of the agreement opens registration to those with a real presence in Switzerland: Swiss public bodies, legal persons on the commercial register whose seat and actual administration are in Switzerland, associations and foundations meeting the same condition, natural persons domiciled there and Swiss nationals. If you hold a Swiss-registered subsidiary, the application is made through that legal entity.
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It is not, and the text says so plainly. A real presence is a necessary condition but does not by itself entitle you to any name you like. The use of the name must also comply with Swiss law, be of a kind generally accepted as legitimate, contribute to the welfare of the community and stand in proportion to the role and importance the name carries. In short, a generic, weighty name demands a stronger basis than an ordinary brand name.
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Registration in this zone is not instantaneous. Your application is published and remains open to competing applications and comments for twenty days; if no objection arrives in that window, the name is assigned in principle within three days. You should therefore plan on roughly three weeks even when nothing goes wrong. Where several eligible applications target one name, the process lengthens and falls to the operator's assessment.
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Measured on 13 August 2026 the zone holds 24,763 registrations, of which 22,819 appear in the zone file, a rate above ninety-two percent. The high figure is no surprise: eligibility checks and a use requirement make it pointless to register a name and sit on it. The consequence for you is that a name showing as free really is free, though qualifying to hold it is a separate matter. Try several variants together through bulk domain name search.
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Yes, scrutiny does not end at registration. The operator applies pre-validation first, then post-validation, and at a later stage statistically targeted random validation, backed by a continuing enforcement programme. Where a declared purpose of use turns out to be untrue, that counts as an indication of bad faith and the name may be suspended. Keep your registration details current and review them regularly through whois search.
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