.ch Domain
Switzerland's Premium Country Domain
Register your .ch domain from just £12.99/yr. Free DNS management, email forwarding, and 10GB mailbox included with every domain.
This domain has registration restrictions
There is no Swiss residency requirement, but a Swiss authority can require a holder without a Swiss correspondence address to name one within 30 days, and the domain is revoked if they do not. Read the full eligibility rules.
What is a .ch domain?
The .ch domain is Switzerland's country code, derived from "Confoederatio Helvetica" (the Latin name for the Swiss Confederation). Managed by SWITCH, it's one of the most respected ccTLDs in Europe. Switzerland's reputation for quality, precision, and financial stability rubs off on the extension. Registration is open to anyone worldwide, though Swiss businesses and organisations make up the vast majority of registrants.
Who should register .ch?
Swiss businesses, financial services firms, watchmakers, pharmaceutical companies, and UK businesses targeting the Swiss market.
Why choose .ch?
- Switzerland's premium country code
- Strong association with quality and precision
- Open to worldwide registration
- Respected across European business
Who runs .ch, and since when
Registry data from the .ch 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
- Country-code (ccTLD)
- Registry operator
- SWITCH The Swiss Education & Research Network
- The organisation that runs the extension
- In the root zone since
- 1987
- Delegated 20 May 1987
- Who can register
- Open to anyone worldwide, subject to a Swiss address if an authority asks for one
- Checked against the registry's own policy
- Our price
- £12.99 a year
- Ex VAT. Renews at the same price
The Swiss address rule behind an open .ch registry
Switzerland runs an open door with one lock on it, and the lock is the part nobody tells you about. Switch, the foundation that operates .ch on behalf of the Federal Office of Communications, sets no nationality or residency test in its general terms. A UK company can register one this afternoon at a price below most extensions in this category.
Section 2.6 of those terms is the condition. On request by a Swiss authority acting within its competence, the registry will ask any holder without a valid Swiss correspondence address to designate one within 30 days and to provide details of their identity. A holder who does not comply in time has the domain revoked, and the authority that asked is told. This is not a routine check and it is not something most holders will ever see, but it is a rule you accept when you register, and it applies for the whole life of the domain rather than at the point of sale.
Section 2.5 carries the more common risk. If the registration data turns out to be incomplete, inaccurate or out of date, to the point where the holder can only be identified with disproportionate effort or messages come back undelivered, Switch is entitled to revoke the domain. Registries say things like that everywhere. Switzerland means it, and a stale mailbox on a domain nobody logs into is how good addresses get lost.
What you are buying, beyond the DNS, is the association. Swiss customers expect .ch, and a UK supplier selling into Switzerland on a .com looks like a UK supplier selling into Switzerland. The extension is one of the cheapest here, so the case for adding one alongside your main address is easy to make.
Who is allowed to register .ch?
There is no Swiss residency requirement, but a Swiss authority can require a holder without a Swiss correspondence address to name one within 30 days, and the domain is revoked if they do not.
- Who may register
- The Switch general terms set no nationality or residency condition. A valid request has to carry current, complete and correct holder details, including name, postal address and email address, but none of those has to be Swiss at the point of registration.
- A Swiss correspondence address on request
- Where a Swiss authority acting within its competence asks, the registry will require a holder who has no valid Swiss correspondence address to designate one within 30 days and to give details of their identity. Plan for who that would be before you need one, particularly if you have no Swiss presence at all.
- Keep your details accurate
- If the registration data proves incomplete, inaccurate or out of date, and as a result the holder can only be identified with disproportionate effort or messages to them bounce, Switch is entitled to revoke the domain. An abandoned contact mailbox is the usual way this happens.
- If you do not comply
- The registry revokes the domain name where the holder does not meet the request in time, and gives notice of the revocation to the Swiss authority that made it. There is no appeal built into the terms, so the fix is to answer promptly rather than to argue afterwards.
Rules taken from the Switch general terms and conditions. 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 .ch the right choice for you?
We would rather sell you the right extension once than the wrong one twice.
.ch works well if
- You sell into Switzerland and want the address to read local to a market that notices. Swiss buyers treat .ch as the default and a foreign address as a question to be answered.
- You already have a Swiss entity, distributor or office, so the correspondence address condition is answered before it is ever asked.
- You want a European country extension without an eligibility test to satisfy at the point of order.
- Budget is tight. This is among the cheapest extensions we sell, so a defensive or market-facing registration is easy to justify.
Look elsewhere if
- You have no Swiss connection of any kind and no way to name a Swiss correspondence address if one is ever demanded.
- You want privacy on the cheap. Free WHOIS privacy applies to .uk extensions under Nominet rules and nowhere else, so on .ch it is a paid add-on.
- Your customers are British. A .ch does nothing for UK search visibility, and Google reads a country code as a signal that a site is aimed at that country, not yours.
Not selling into Switzerland yet? Register the .co.uk first and add the .ch when there is a Swiss customer to point it at. See .co.uk pricing.
.ch vs .co.uk: which should you register?
These are the same kind of object aimed at different countries, so the comparison is mostly about which market you want a search engine to file you under. Google is explicit that a country-code extension gives a strong signal that a site is intended for a particular country. You cannot point that signal at two countries with one domain.
.co.uk is the correct primary address for a business selling to British customers, and it comes with free WHOIS privacy under Nominet's consent-based rules plus transfers that complete almost immediately because they are an IPS tag change. .ch is the correct address for the Swiss version of the same business, on a separate site or a separate language section, not as a replacement.
Run both if you sell in both places. Pointing a .ch at an English-language UK site with British prices is the version that fails, because the address promises something the page does not deliver.
| .ch | .co.uk | |
|---|---|---|
| Who may register | Anyone, no residency test | Anyone |
| Local address rule | Swiss address on official request | None |
| WHOIS privacy | Paid add-on | Free under Nominet rules |
| Transfer speed | Hours to days | Near instant, IPS tag change |
| Country signal | Switzerland | United Kingdom |
.ch domain questions, answered
What people ask us before registering a .ch domain.
Can't find what you're looking for?
Ask us directlyNo. The Switch general terms set no nationality or residency requirement, so a UK individual or company can register one. What the terms do reserve is the right, on request from a Swiss authority, to require a holder with no valid Swiss correspondence address to designate one within 30 days. Register with details you keep current, and know in advance who your Swiss point of contact would be.
It is section 2.6 of the Switch terms. Where a Swiss authority acting within its competence asks, the registry requires any .ch holder without a valid Swiss correspondence address to name one within 30 days and provide details of their identity. If the holder does not comply in time the domain is revoked and the authority is notified. It is not a routine check, and it is not something a registrar can waive on your behalf.
Usually yes, and it is one of the cheaper extensions to test the idea with. Swiss buyers default to .ch and read a foreign address as a reason to look twice. The mistake is treating the domain as the whole job: an address that promises a Swiss supplier and lands on a UK page with sterling prices and UK delivery terms does more harm than having no .ch at all.
Switch, the Swiss education and research network foundation, operates the registry on behalf of the Federal Office of Communications. Its own description is that it manages all domain names ending .ch in the global DNS and carries out the task for OFCOM. The extension has been in the root zone since May 1987, which makes it one of the oldest country codes still running, and registrations are handled through accredited registrars rather than by the registry directly.
Included with Your .ch 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 .ch domain today
Secure your .ch domain from just £12.99/yr. Free DNS management, email forwarding, and 10GB mailbox included.
