How Does Domain Pricing Work?

Domain Names are a regulated industry. There are registries, which are wholesalers, and there are registrars, which are retailers. For many years you could only be one or the other, though now you can be both as long as you follow a few industry rules. GoDaddy is famous as the world’s largest registrar (GoDaddy.com) but they also run the domain registry for many top-level domains like .design. In the case where they’re registering domain extensions they own, they collect the wholesale fee and then also get to add on their standard retail markup! That’s a good gig. 

Porkbun is a domain registrar, meaning we sell domains directly to the public.

Domain Name Pricing at a Glance

Every domain extension (like .com, .net, .design, etc.) has a wholesale price set by the registry that manages it. Domain registrars like Porkbun or GoDaddy then set their retail price, which may include a small markup, along with any applicable fees.

One standard fee added into the domain pricing is the ICANN fee, which is currently $0.20 per domain per year. ICANN (the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) is the organization that coordinates and manages the global domain name system and is an unavoidable fee attached to domain name registrations.

Domain name pricing may also include credit card processing fees. At Porkbun, we keep all of this as low and transparent as possible so you know exactly what you’re paying for.

Porkbun Domain Pricing Structure

We like things simple and honest when it comes to domain pricing, and we know you do, too. While some registrars reel you in with ultra-low first-year prices only to inflate the markup on domain renewal rates later, we’re upfront from the start. There are no sneaky fees, no gotchas — just clear, consistent pricing you can trust.

Our strategy is marking up $1 or less on all standard domain names, but Porkbun sells most domains at cost! Here is what that looks like: