Press Release from the SIDN
---

Arnhem, 11 July 2008 – SIDN, the .nl registry, this afternoon registered the three millionth .nl domain name. The name was registered by SIDN registrar 3minds webdesign+ of Groningen, for a private individual in Amsterdam.

Strong domain
In total, there are about 250 country-code top-level domains. Of these only three are bigger than the .nl domain: .de (with more than twelve million names), .cn (nearly twelve million) and .co.uk (nearly seven million). In terms of the number of domain names per head of the population, .nl comes out top, with nearly one registration for every five people in the country.

Private registrants
A study of SIDN’s database carried out earlier this year revealed that most of the current growth in .nl registrations is accounted for by private individuals. Last year, the size of the retail market increased by four percentage points relative to the business market. The survey indicated that Dutch consumers who register their own domain names are mainly interested in having a more professional Internet profile, some with a view to perhaps using their domain names for business purposes in the future.

Netherlands leads the way
In terms of Internet use and broadband take-up, the Netherlands is among the world’s leading nations. No less than 82 per cent of Dutch households had Internet access in 2007 – a figure surpassed only by Korea and Denmark, and 25 per cent above the OECD average. At 35 per cent, broadband take-up in the Netherlands is higher than anywhere in the world except Denmark, where the figure is one percentage point higher. Some 97 per cent of Dutch businesses use the Internet, while 81 per cent of the population goes on line at least once a week. The average person spends twelve hours a week on the net. Nine out of ten Dutch Internet users now say that they couldn’t manage without Internet access.

Roelof Meijer, SIDN’s CEO said, “The strength of the .nl domain is down to a number of factors. First, the high levels of Internet use and broadband penetration. Then there is the strong sales channel, with its two-thousand-plus registrars, which means that businesses and retail customers have little trouble finding a suitable provider of registration, Hosting and e-mail services. Another important thing is that it’s easy to register a .nl domain name, whether you are in the Netherlands or not. We expect growth to continue – there’s no danger of us ‘running out’ of .nl domain names. In fact, the Dutch are very creative when it comes to inventing domain names, which may go some way to explaining why our domain names are, on average, the longest in the world!”

Facts & figures
  • The average .nl domain name is sixteen characters long, compared with a global average for other TLDs of thirteen characters.
  • The greatest concentration of .nl registrants is in Amsterdam, but the university cities of Groningen, Enschede, Nijmegen and Eindhoven are also hotspots.
  • Some 66 per cent of registrants use their .nl domain names for personal e-mail addresses.
  • The very first .nl domain name registered was ‘cwi.nl’, which is still active.
  • An average of more than 1,700 .nl domain names is registered every day (before adjustment for cancellations).
  • The most expensive .nl domain name ever to change hands was ‘voetbal.nl’, which was sold for a million guilders in 2000. (‘Voetbal’ is Dutch for ‘soccer’.)
  • The prices of .nl domain names sold at auction rose by an average of 50 per cent last year, from € 1,000 to € 1,500 (sedo).
  • The .nl domain has a 70 per cent share of the Dutch market for domain names; other leading players are .com, with 14 per cent, and .eu with 9 per cent.
  • Private registrants made up 33 per cent of the .nl registrant community on 1 January 2008, compared with 29 per cent on 1 January 2007.