.vip Domain: A Very Large Zone With a Clear Promise
The .vip extension entered the root zone on 30 July 2015; its ICANN agreement is dated 22 January 2015 and has been amended five times since. The registry operator today is Registry Services, LLC. Membership programmes, private event invitations, clubs, luxury retailers and services that open a privileged area for their customers all take names here.
The abbreviation reads the same in all four of our languages and needs no translation, which lets an international project use a single address in every market. The zone is among the largest in the programme: 2,934,295 registrations on 14 August 2026. At that scale short, common roots are taken, so work with distinctive combinations and test candidates on the .vip domain search page.
In a crowded zone the real question is not who may take a name but how abuse is handled. For this extension the agreement puts an acceptable use policy under contract: the rules are published openly, registrars make holders accept them at sign-up, a public reporting channel and a single point of contact for law enforcement are maintained, an abused name can be suspended, and so can every name held by the same registrant. Geographic names and intergovernmental organisation names are blocked at the second level.
.VIP Domain at a Glance
- Registry operator Registry Services, LLC
- Root zone entry 30 July 2015
- Agreement 22 January 2015; amended five times since
- Agreement commitment AUP, 60-day Trademark Sunrise, geographic and IGO name blocking
- Zone size 2,934,295 registrations (14 August 2026)
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .vip domain
- Character Length 1 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.vip 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
$19.49 /year -
Transfer
$19.49 /year -
Renewal
$20.99 /year -
Restore
$119.90 -
Late Renewal
$7.26
Included With Every .vip 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.
.vip Domain Lifecycle
What happens day by day after it expires
Day 0 is the domain's expiry dateIn short: your .vip 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 .vip 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 .vip 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 $7.26 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 .vip 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
.vip Domain Specifications and Registration Rules
Registration conditions, supported features and the registry's own timelines in a single table.
.vip Domain Registration
- Document Requirement No documents are required to register a .vip domain
- Character Length 1 - 63 characters
- Registration Period 1 - 10 years
- Name Server Count 2 - 10 servers
.vip Domain Support
- IDN Support Yes
- Transfer Support Yes
- Late Renewal Support Yes
Frequently Asked Questions About .vip Domains
The questions people actually ask before registering — answered plainly.
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You can, but the method changes. At that density, trying common single-word roots wastes time; what works is your brand name or a distinctive two-word combination. A second rule applies as well: the extension already carries a promise, so repeating the same promise in the root adds nothing. Keep your candidate list wide and, instead of testing one at a time, run it in a single step through bulk domain name search.
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Those where the privilege is real. Where there are membership tiers, invited access, limited places or a dedicated service, the address makes good on its promise and the user knows what to expect. In an ordinary catalogue open to everyone, the same address does not meet the expectation, and that gap erodes trust. The decision rule is simple: if something on the page really is privileged the extension earns its place, and if not it is decoration.
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Attempts at abuse do grow as a zone grows; what matters is whether a mechanism exists. For this extension the agreement places an acceptable use policy obligation on the registry, leading to suspension of an abused name and, where needed, of every name held by the same person. If a name carrying your brand has been taken by someone else, start by establishing the facts: check the registrant with whois search.
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The contractual pattern is the same but the scale is entirely different. The .vodka zone, run by the same registry operator, holds 2,180 registrations against 2,934,295 here; a shared parent brings a shared policy, not a shared market size. The practical consequence: finding a short root is easy in one and close to impossible in the other. When choosing, look at the size of the zone rather than the agreement.
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It does. A membership flow collects login details, usually payment and sometimes identity verification data; on an unencrypted connection all of it stays readable in transit and the browser warns your visitor. Seeing a security warning at an address that promises privilege undermines the promise itself. Compare the options on the SSL certificate page.
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