Domains: A Quick Overview of Namecheap, Godaddy, and Yahoo.

For those looking for domains, there's a large number of domain providers (aka registars) you can choose from so there's quite a few choices you can chose from. For this post, I'll be going over Yahoo Domains, Godaddy, and Namecheap. All of them offer domains and whois protection, but it's the little stuff that sets them apart


Godaddy - http://godaddy.com/
 This is probably one of the most well-known domain registrars out their due to their PR department. They feature over 60 top level domains, though for many of those you need to have a residential address in the country in order to purchase them. Dot coms cost 11.99 USD a year, so it's ok pricing. If I remember correctly, they include domain privacy for free for the very first year, after that it's an extra cost of 8.99 each time you renew, so it's a bit pricy to pay somewhere near twenty dollars to renew for each yeah. Their tech support can be spotty, as I've had good experiences and a few bad ones where the techie didn't know what they were doing. If you want to look over the bad side of godaddy, just google for "Godaddy" and you'll find NoDaddy on the first page. Please note that if you sign up through them, they will send off promotional emails constantly unless you opt out of it.

Namecheap - http://www.namecheap.com/

This company is a reseller who's parent company is Enom, who prides itself on affordable pricing. It currently offers 26 different top level domains. Dot com domains cost 9.98 USD a year, which is good for those who want to save a little bit of money when getting a domain. Domains overall are a bit cheaper, so it's worth the tradeoff that comes with having a semi-limited selection of top level domain extensions. Their form of whois privacy comes free for the first year, and only costs 2.88 a year afterwards. Having dealt with their tech support only a few times, I can only say that it's top-notch, and I hope it stays that way.

Yahoo Domains - http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/domains/
This is useful if you have an account through Yahoo. There's a very limited selection of top level domain extensions that you can choose from, and they all cost the same price at 9.95 USD. It's good pricing, but the limited selection along with the dot info domain extension costing the same price, it may not be worth it. For those who may not be familiar with dot info domains, they're the cheapest domain available costing around 2.00 USD yearly at other registars. Domain privacy costs around 9.00 USD per year. I haven't used their tech support, so I have nothing to say about it.

That concludes my domains post/rant/thing, so if anyone is looking to register a domain, I hope this helps them a little bit.