.cat Domain
Catalonia's Cultural Domain
Register your .cat domain from just £12.00/yr. Free DNS management, email forwarding, and 10GB mailbox included with every domain.
This domain has registration restrictions
Only a member of the Catalan linguistic and cultural community may hold a .cat, and the registry may suspend or cancel a name after registration where the declaration does not hold up. Read the full eligibility rules.
What is a .cat domain?
The .cat domain represents the Catalan linguistic and cultural community, making it one of the internet's few language-based TLDs. Managed by Fundacio puntCAT, it was launched in 2005 and is used by Catalan-speaking businesses, cultural organisations, and public institutions across Catalonia, the Balearic Islands, Andorra, and Valencia. To register, your site must have content in Catalan or relate to Catalan culture.
Who should register .cat?
Catalan businesses, cultural institutions in Catalonia, Balearic Islands tourism operators, and organisations publishing in Catalan.
Why choose .cat?
- One of the internet's few language-based TLDs
- Strong Catalan cultural identity
- Requires Catalan content (quality namespace)
- Backed by Fundacio puntCAT
Who runs .cat, and since when
Registry data from the .cat delegation record held by IANA, which maintains the internet's root zone. Eligibility comes from the registry's own policy, and the prices are ours.
- Extension type
- Sponsored (sTLD)
- Registry operator
- Fundacio puntCAT
- The organisation that runs the extension
- In the root zone since
- 2005
- Delegated 19 December 2005
- Who can register
- Restricted to the Catalan linguistic and cultural community, declared at registration
- Checked against the registry's own policy
- Our price
- £12.00 a year
- Ex VAT. Renews at the same price
How the .cat community rule is actually enforced
Every other extension on this list defines its members by geography, or by nothing at all. .cat defines them by language. It was the first extension granted to a linguistic and cultural community rather than to a country or an industry, and it entered the root zone in December 2005.
The rule is a declaration rather than a document check. The registry's policy says that to register a .cat you declare you are part of the Catalan linguistic and cultural community on the terms set out in Specification 12 of its ICANN agreement, and that if you do not comply the registry may suspend or cancel the name after its registration. Specification 12 defines that community as people who use Catalan for their online communications, or promote aspects of Catalan culture online, or want to address their communications specifically to that community. Any one of the three is enough.
That is a wider door than most summaries suggest. A Barcelona business publishing a Catalan version of its site walks through it. A UK company with no Catalan content anywhere does not, and the enforcement point comes after the sale, which is the worst possible time to find out.
Who is allowed to register .cat?
Only a member of the Catalan linguistic and cultural community may hold a .cat, and the registry may suspend or cancel a name after registration where the declaration does not hold up.
- What you declare
- The registry's registration policy requires you to declare that you are part of the Catalan linguistic and cultural community on the terms of Specification 12 of its agreement with ICANN, which is incorporated into the policy by reference rather than reprinted in it.
- Who counts as a member
- Specification 12 defines the community as those who use the Catalan language for their online communications, and/or promote the different aspects of Catalan culture online, and/or want to specifically address their online communications to that community. Meeting any one of the three is enough.
- Examples the charter names
- The charter lists universities and schools using Catalan, entities whose aim is promoting Catalan culture, writers, translators and journalists publishing in Catalan, publishers of Catalan works, media using Catalan, and any individual, group or business carrying online communications in Catalan. Membership can also be shown by sponsorship from existing members.
- If you do not qualify
- The policy states that where you do not comply the registry may suspend or cancel the registered domain name after its registration, and may also cancel a name whose use has deviated from the intended use declared when it was registered. Nothing is checked at the checkout, so a refusal lands on a live site rather than an order.
Rules taken from the .cat domain policies. Registry policy can change, so check before you buy if the answer matters to you.
Not sure whether you qualify? Ask us before you order and we will check the registry rules with you. We would rather answer the question than take an order the registry will refuse.
Is .cat the right choice for you?
We would rather sell you the right extension once than the wrong one twice.
.cat works well if
- You publish in Catalan, or you are about to. That single fact settles the eligibility question and makes the ending an accurate label rather than a decoration.
- You are a cultural body, publisher, school or media outlet working in Catalan, where the ending reads as belonging rather than as a marketing choice.
- You trade in Catalonia, the Balearics or Andorra and want the Catalan-language site kept separate from a Spanish-language one.
Look elsewhere if
- You picked it because it spells "cat". The community rule is real, and the registry can cancel the name after it has been registered and put to use.
- Your site is Spanish or English only, with no plan to add Catalan. That is precisely the case the policy is written to catch.
- Your audience is outside Catalonia. Away from the community those three letters read as a pet site, and you will spend every phone call explaining otherwise.
Trading in Spain in Spanish rather than Catalan? A .com.es fits the market without the community rule. See .com.es pricing.
.cat vs .com.es: which should you register?
These two divide Spain along a line that has nothing to do with borders. A .com.es is Spanish and open to anyone with links to Spain. A .cat is Catalan and open only to the linguistic and cultural community, which is a smaller set defined by what you publish rather than by where you sit.
For a business trading in Catalonia the choice is often not either or. A Catalan-language site on .cat and a Spanish-language site on .com.es is a clean split that reads correctly to both audiences, and it avoids the awkwardness of putting Catalan content on a Spanish national extension. If you are only ever going to run one site and it is not in Catalan, .com.es is the honest choice, and it is the one you can hold without making a declaration you cannot support.
.cat domain questions, answered
What people ask us before registering a .cat domain.
Can't find what you're looking for?
Ask us directlyOnly if it belongs to the Catalan linguistic and cultural community, and being British does not rule that out. The test is what you publish, not where you are registered. A UK publisher producing Catalan-language material, or an organisation whose purpose includes promoting Catalan culture online, falls inside the charter. A UK company with an English-only site and no Catalan connection does not, and the registry can act on that after the name has been registered.
Not necessarily, though it is the simplest way to qualify. The charter behind .cat sets three alternative grounds: using Catalan for your online communications, promoting aspects of Catalan culture online, or wanting to address your communications specifically to that community. Any one is enough, so a site in another language about Catalan culture can qualify. What will not qualify is a site with no Catalan language and no Catalan subject matter, chosen because the three letters looked good.
The name can be suspended or cancelled, and the policy is explicit that this can happen after registration rather than at the point of sale. The registry also reserves the right to cancel a name whose use has deviated from the purpose declared when it was registered. In practice that means a working website and its email going dark. If your eligibility is arguable rather than obvious, put the Catalan content up before you build anything important on the address.
Included with Your .cat Domain
DNS Management
Full DNS zone editor to manage A, CNAME, MX, TXT, and all record types.
Email Forwarding
Set up professional email addresses and forward to any inbox.
Auto-Renewal
Never lose your domain with automatic renewal protection.
Free 10GB Mailbox
One 10GB mailbox (POP3/IMAP) included with every domain, on any TLD.
Other Geographic Domains Extensions
Register your .cat domain today
Secure your .cat domain from just £12.00/yr. Free DNS management, email forwarding, and 10GB mailbox included.
