Country-Code Domains (ccTLDs): Who Runs Them, Who Can Register, and Who Profits

What a ccTLD is

A country-code top-level domain (ccTLD) is the two-letter ending of a web address that belongs to a country or territory: .de for Germany, .jp for Japan, .br for Brazil. The first ones, including .us, .uk and .il, were registered in 1985. Today there are more than 300 delegated ccTLDs once you count the versions in non-Latin scripts; Wikipedia's count was 316 in June 2020.

They are a large part of the internet. Verisign's Domain Name Industry Brief counted 401.6 million registered domain names at the end of June 2026, of which 148.6 million were under ccTLDs. The ten largest ccTLDs by registrations were, in order, .cn, .de, .uk, .ru, .nl, .br, .fr, .au, .in and .eu.

Each Beelad country page shows the country's internet domain next to its ISO 3166 codes. Of Beelad's 196 countries, 195 have one; Kosovo has none, because it has no ISO country code.

Who decides which ccTLDs exist

The rules go back to RFC 1591, a short document written by Jon Postel in 1994. Its central idea was to avoid political judgments: the IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) would not decide what counts as a country, and would instead follow the ISO 3166-1 list. As Postel put it, "The IANA is not in the business of deciding what is and what is not a country."

IANA keeps the root zone database, the top of the domain name system, and delegates each ccTLD to a manager in or connected to that country. Since 1 October 2016 the IANA functions have been performed by Public Technical Identifiers (PTI), an affiliate of ICANN, after the US government's contract for the role ended. The manager, often called the registry, sets the registration rules and runs the database. Registrars sell names to the public and pass them on to the registry.

Where the ISO rule breaks

Almost every ccTLD matches an ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 code. On Beelad's list, the only country whose domain differs from its ISO code is the United Kingdom. The exceptions and leftovers are worth knowing:

The pattern is that the ISO list drives creation and, eventually, removal. When an ISO code is withdrawn, the ccTLD normally goes too, after a transition period.

Who can register: open and restricted ccTLDs

Each registry writes its own eligibility rules. Some accept anyone; others require a local presence or a local tax number.

Registration rules change, so check the registry's own policy page before you rely on any of these.

Second-level structures

Some registries sell names directly under the country code (example.de); others split the space by category first. The UK is the clearest case. From 24 July 1985 until 10 June 2014, names could only be registered at the third level, such as .co.uk for companies, .org.uk for non-profits, .ac.uk for universities and colleges and .gov.uk for government. Direct .uk names opened in 2014, but .co.uk still holds most registrations. Meanwhile .gb, the domain that would match the ISO code, was reserved, never widely used and no longer accepts registrations. Software that guesses the "main" part of a domain by taking the last two labels gets co.uk wrong, which is why browsers and libraries rely on a maintained list of public suffixes.

The "vanity" ccTLD economy

Some small territories own two letters that happen to spell something useful in English. Registries market them worldwide, and the income can matter a lot to a small budget.

.ai (Anguilla)

Anguilla, a British overseas territory in the Caribbean, holds .ai. After ChatGPT launched in November 2022, registrations rose from 144,000 in 2022 to 354,000 in 2023, according to the IMF. That year the domain brought in EC$87 million, about US$32 million, or just over 20% of government revenue, up from around 5% before the boom. A two-year registration cost US$140.

.tv (Tuvalu)

Tuvalu, with a population of 9,816 (UN estimate for 1 July 2023), has licensed .tv to foreign operators since 1998. Verisign ran it from 2001 until it declined to renew in 2021; GoDaddy signed a new contract on 14 December 2021, with payments reported at about US$10 million a year. By 2019, .tv royalties made up 8.4% of the government's revenue.

Others

.co (Colombia) is marketed to companies as an alternative to the generic domains, and .me (Montenegro) is also sold worldwide. Older examples are domain hacks that spell phrases, such as I.am (Armenia), tip.it (Italy) and go.to (Tonga). Whatever the marketing, the domain is still delegated to that country's manager under IANA rules.

Domains in other scripts

Internationalized ccTLDs let countries use their own script. ICANN's IDN ccTLD Fast Track opened on 16 November 2009, and on 5 May 2010 the first three went live, all in Arabic script: Egypt (مصر), Saudi Arabia (السعودية) and the United Arab Emirates (امارات). Others now cover Cyrillic, Chinese, Devanagari, Greek, Hebrew and many more scripts; Israel's ישראל domain (xn--4dbrk0ce) became available in 2022.

The DNS itself only stores letters a–z, digits and hyphens, so each IDN label is converted to an ASCII form called Punycode, marked with the prefix xn--. Your browser shows the native script; resolvers and name servers see the ASCII form.

Quick checklist

• A ccTLD normally matches the ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 code, but .uk, .eu, .ac and .su do not follow that rule.
• IANA delegates ccTLDs; since 2016 that work is done by PTI, an ICANN affiliate.
• Eligibility is set by each registry: .de and .uk are open, .ca, .jp and .br require local ties.
• Vanity domains can fund small governments: .ai was just over 20% of Anguilla's revenue in 2023.
• Internationalized ccTLDs use Punycode (xn--) in the DNS.