.tokyo Domain: A City Extension Without a Residency Rule
The .tokyo extension entered the root on 16 January 2014; its ICANN agreement is dated 13 November 2013 and the registry operator is GMO Registry, Inc. The operator describes it as a geographic extension for the city of Tokyo and states its purpose as giving citizens, businesses and community groups a platform to link their identity to the city's brand. General availability opened on 22 July 2014.
A frequent misreading appears right here: people assume the extension requires residence or an office in Tokyo. The registry's registration policy says the opposite and states plainly that any natural person or entity is eligible to register. The reasoning sits in the same document, since broad registration and use serve the goal of promoting Tokyo as a brand. Test candidates on the .tokyo domain search page.
Registry policy reserves two-character labels, country and territory names, the names of wards, cities, towns and villages in Tokyo, strings related to tourism and transport, and other names touching the public interest. Those names may be released later to promote the city's economy and culture. If you plan a project around a district name, check first whether that root is reserved.
.TOKYO Domain at a Glance
- Registry operator GMO Registry, Inc.
- Root zone entry 16 January 2014; general availability 22 July 2014
- Eligibility None; policy treats any natural person or entity as eligible
- Reserved names Ward and district names, tourism and transport strings, public interest names
- Zone size 135,901 registrations, 85,461 live (14 August 2026)
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .tokyo domain
- Character Length 3 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.tokyo 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
$21.50 /year -
Transfer
$21.54 /year -
Renewal
$23.69 /year -
Restore
$84.90 -
Late Renewal
$4.74
Included With Every .tokyo 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.
.tokyo Domain Lifecycle
What happens day by day after it expires
Day 0 is the domain's expiry dateIn short: your .tokyo 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 .tokyo 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 .tokyo 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 $4.74 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 .tokyo 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
.tokyo Domain Specifications and Registration Rules
Registration conditions, supported features and the registry's own timelines in a single table.
.tokyo Domain Registration
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .tokyo domain
- Character Length 3 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.tokyo Domain Support
- IDN Support Yes
- Transfer Support Yes
- Late Renewal Support Yes
Frequently Asked Questions About .tokyo Domains
The questions people actually ask before registering — answered plainly.
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No, you do not. The registry's registration policy states plainly that any natural person or entity is eligible to register, so residence, an office and a local contact all sit outside the rules. The policy gives its reasoning as well, since broad registration and use serve the goal of promoting the city as a brand. A business anywhere registers on exactly the same terms.
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Yes, the registry supports Japanese script. Its own pages state that names built from hiragana, katakana and kanji are accepted, with a separate length limit defined for them. Latin-script names may use letters, digits and hyphens only. For a project addressing the Japanese market, Japanese script sends a strong signal, while publishing the Latin form alongside it keeps things easy for visitors from abroad.
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In most cases no. Registry policy reserves the names of wards, cities, towns and villages in Tokyo, along with strings related to tourism and transport and other names touching the public interest. Those may be released at a later date to promote the city's economy and culture. If your plan rests on a district name, check the root first with bulk domain name search.
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The registry retired its port 43 WHOIS service on 1 May 2026. Its servers now return only a notice explaining that registration data is served through RDAP under ICANN's transition policy. In practice older command line tools come back empty, and you need a modern interface to read registration data. For general lookups you can use the whois search page.
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Moderate. On 14 August 2026 the zone held 135,901 registrations, of which 85,461 were live. At that size most single-word Japanese and English roots are taken, yet sector and brand combinations stay open. If you offer a service aimed at the Tokyo market, joining the service word to your brand is the practical route, and repeating the city name becomes unnecessary.
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