// 27 guides · 16 topics
guides.
What domains actually cost to keep, how to move them, and what to do when one is about to lapse. Written because the existing answers to these questions are mostly affiliate pages with a table of first-year prices.
best domain portfolio management software in 2026
an honest look at DomainMOD, Watch My Domains, Efty, Domainyze, registrar dashboards, spreadsheets and owndle — what each one is genuinely good at, and who should skip it.
cheapest domain registrar uk: .co.uk renewal prices compared
what .co.uk actually costs to renew in the UK, why VAT makes headline prices misleading, and why legacy registrars like 123 Reg and IONOS creep upward year after year.
cheapest place to renew a .com
Where to actually renew a .com for the least money, why registrars charge such different prices for an identical product, and when moving is worth the admin.
cloudflare registrar review: at-cost domains, the catch, and who it's for
cloudflare sells domains at the wholesale registry price with no markup, which is why it keeps winning our price tables. the four real catches, stated fairly, and the kind of person each one disqualifies.
dan.com has shut down: where to manage and sell domains now
dan.com was acquired by GoDaddy, folded into Afternic and switched off in 2025. what replaced each job it did — selling, portfolio tracking, landing pages — and what quietly did not get replaced at all.
domain grace period vs redemption period: what each stage costs you
the full expiry lifecycle stage by stage — what state the domain is in, whether the site still works, whether you can still save it, and what recovery costs relative to a normal renewal.
google sheets vs a domain tracker: when your spreadsheet stops scaling
a spreadsheet is a genuinely good domain inventory below about ten domains at one registrar. here is exactly where the line is, and the three failures no amount of spreadsheet craft can fix.
how accurate are domain appraisals?
what an automated domain valuation is actually computing, why estimates and realised sale prices diverge so far, the incentive problem when a marketplace values names for its own listings, and the one job these tools do well.
how long does a domain transfer take?
five days if you wait, under an hour if you approve the confirmation email yourself — plus the locks, dead contact addresses and registrar friction that turn a same-day job into a fortnight.
how to audit your domain renewal costs with claude code
the owndle MCP server is on npm. install it, point Claude Code at it, and ask what your domains cost — total annual spend, what you are overpaying on, and what expires next.
how to get a domain that's about to expire
the deletion lifecycle from the buyer's side: when a name actually becomes available, what a backorder really buys you, why drop-catchers win anything worth having, and the route with the best odds — asking the owner.
how to lower your domain renewal costs
Seven ways to lower domain renewal costs, ranked by how much they actually save, and honest about which ones are barely worth the afternoon.
how to manage client domains as an agency
a lapsed client domain is a dead site, a dead mailbox and a furious client — and it will be your fault regardless of whose account it was in. ownership, monitoring, reporting and offboarding, done properly.
how to manage domains across multiple registrars
consolidate or stay spread? the honest trade-off between simplicity and price, the four failure modes of a scattered portfolio, and how to run one without losing a domain.
how to tell if a domain renewal notice is a scam
postal invoices, domain slamming and phishing expiry emails — the three species of fake renewal notice, and a 60-second check that settles it every time.
is .io still safe for your startup? .io vs .com in 2026
the sovereignty question hanging over .io and what it does and does not mean, the renewal cost gap against .com, and an unexcited answer about which one to build on.
my domain expired — can i get it back?
stage-by-stage recovery: grace period, redemption, pending delete and dropped. what each one costs, what still works, and the point at which honesty requires saying no.
namecheap renewal higher than registration? here's why
A Namecheap renewal price higher than registration is not a bait and switch. It is how the entire registrar industry prices. Here is the mechanic, and when to move.
namechk alternatives: username and domain checkers that still work
why username availability checkers go stale, how to tell a maintained one from an abandoned one, and what to verify by hand before you commit a name across a dozen platforms.
owndle vs domainmod: portfolio tracking without running a server
domainmod is free, open source and genuinely good if you already run a server. an honest comparison of what each tool answers, where the self-hosting cost really lands, and who should pick which.
owndle vs watch my domains: a modern alternative to desktop domain software
watch my domains is mature, licensed software built for very large lists and local data. where that model still wins, where a hosted tracker wins, and how to tell which one you are.
should i renew or drop? the annual domain portfolio audit
a keep, sell or drop framework for a portfolio that grew by accident: what each name is doing, what it protects, what it would cost to get back, and why sunk cost is the reason most people renew things they should let go.
squarespace domain renewal cost: what ex-google domains owners pay now
Google Domains was sold to Squarespace in 2023 and around 10 million domains moved with it. Here is what the Squarespace domain renewal cost means for you.
the domain portfolio spreadsheet template (and when to stop using it)
the exact column schema for a domain inventory spreadsheet, the formulas worth adding, and the three things a spreadsheet structurally cannot do no matter how well you build it.
the true cost of a domain over 5 years
Year-one pricing tells you almost nothing. Here is how to work out the true cost of a domain over 5 years, and why renewals cost more than registrations everywhere.
why domain auto-renew fails (and how to not lose your domain)
auto-renew is a payment instruction, not a guarantee. the silent failure modes — expired cards, spam-filtered notices, transfers that reset the flag — and the layer that catches them.
why is my godaddy renewal so expensive?
Your GoDaddy renewal is several times what you paid in year one. Here is exactly what is on the invoice, how big the gap really is, and whether transferring is worth it.