'.es' domain names on the up

The number of ‘.es’ domain name registrations rose during 2013, despite recorded negative growth rates in many other domain name extensions in the same period.

The registry responsible for domain name registrations in Spain, Red.es, recently announced that a total of 1,696,538 ‘.es’ domain names were registered at the end of 2013. This number represented an increase of 5.1% when compared to the 1,614,149 registered domain names at the end of 2012.

Drilling down further into figures, Red.es revealed that domain name registrants in Spain still prefer to use the ‘.es’ domain name space rather than other available extensions. The ‘.es’ domain name space holds a 50% market share of all domain name registration in Spain. The market share of other extensions stood at 36.31% for ‘.com’, 4.81% for ‘.net’, 3.22% for ‘.org’, 3.02% for ‘.eu’ and 2.05% for ‘.cat’ domain names.

Red.es also reported that there were almost 3.5 million domain names across all top-level domains registered to Spanish registrants at the end of 2013. It also noted that 1,458,268 ‘.es’ domain names were registered from within Spain (85.96%), while 238,270 were registered overseas (14.04%), with the regions of Madrid, Catalonia and Andalusia registering the most ‘.es’ domain names.

To visit the Red.es website in English, please click here.

David Taylor and Tony Vitali, Hogan Lovells LLP, Paris