.social Domain
Build Your Social Platform
Register your .social domain from just £34.99/yr. Free DNS management, email forwarding, and 10GB mailbox included with every domain.
What is a .social domain?
The .social domain is for social networking platforms, community forums, and social enterprise organisations. It covers a wide spectrum: from Mastodon instances and niche discussion boards to social enterprises registered with the CIC regulator. The word "social" carries dual meaning, and the domain benefits from both.
Who should register .social?
Social networking platforms, community forums, Mastodon instance operators, and registered social enterprises.
Why choose .social?
- Dual meaning: networking and enterprise
- Growing with federated social platforms
- Clear community signal
- Professional for CIC social enterprises
Who runs .social, and since when
Registry data from the .social 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
- Generic (gTLD)
- Registry operator
- Dog Beach, LLC
- The organisation that runs the extension
- In the root zone since
- 2014
- Delegated 9 January 2014
- Who can register
- Open to anyone worldwide, with no community or organisation test
- Checked against the registry's own policy
- Our price
- £34.99 a year
- Ex VAT. Renews at the same price
What .social means to two different buyers
Two unrelated groups buy a .social domain, and they want opposite things from it. One runs federated social software: Mastodon servers, Lemmy instances, anything speaking ActivityPub. The other is the social enterprise end of the market, where social means social good rather than social networking. The extension serves both because the word does, which is a strength in a name and a weakness in a signal.
The fediverse case is real rather than marketing. mastodon.social, the best known server on the network, serves its site at that address rather than pointing it somewhere else, which is more than a lot of showcase registrations on newer extensions manage. If you are standing up an instance and want the address to say what the thing is before anyone reads a word of the page, this extension does that job.
The social enterprise case is weaker, and we would say so to a customer before taking the order. A community interest company is asking a funder, a commissioner or a donor to trust it, and .org still carries more of that trust in Britain than any 2014 arrival has managed to build. This is also one of the pricier extensions in the category, running to roughly three and a half times a .co.uk every year, which is a real line on a small charity's budget.
Registration is open. Dog Beach, LLC operates it as part of Identity Digital, nothing is verified about what you do, and no one checks that your site is social in either sense of the word.
Is .social the right choice for you?
We would rather sell you the right extension once than the wrong one twice.
.social works well if
- You are running a Mastodon, Lemmy or other fediverse instance and want the address itself to say what it is.
- You are building a members' community or a discussion board, and the matching .com went years ago.
- Your product is social software and you need a name short enough to sit inside a handle.
- The name reads as a phrase across the dot, so the extension is doing work rather than sitting there.
Look elsewhere if
- You are a charity or CIC asking funders to trust you. A .org carries more weight in Britain and costs less than half as much.
- People will hear the address before they see it, and many will reach for .com or .co.uk without thinking.
- You are watching the annual bill. This is one of the more expensive extensions in the category, and it recurs for ever.
Running a social enterprise rather than a social network? A .org is cheaper and far better understood by UK funders. See .org pricing.
.social vs .org: which should you register?
These two get shortlisted together because the word social pulls in the social enterprise sector, where .org has been the default for decades. The comparison is really about who is reading the address.
Pick .social when the thing you are naming is a network or a platform, and the audience is online enough to read the extension as a description. Pick .org when the reader is a funder, a council commissioner or a donor, and the address needs to look established rather than current.
| .social | .org | |
|---|---|---|
| In the root zone since | 2014 | 1985 |
| Typical buyer | Fediverse and community platforms | Charities, nonprofits, projects |
| Annual cost | Over twice a .org | Low |
| Recognition | Strong online, weak offline | Understood everywhere |
| Eligibility test | None | None |
.social domain questions, answered
What people ask us before registering a .social domain.
Can't find what you're looking for?
Ask us directlyYes. There is no eligibility test, no membership requirement and no check that your site has anything to do with social networking or social enterprise. Dog Beach, LLC runs the extension as part of Identity Digital, and its acceptable use policy is the only real constraint: the registry can suspend or cancel a name used for phishing, malware, spam or trademark infringement, at its own discretion.
Yes, and it is the clearest case for the extension. A fediverse audience reads the extension as part of the description rather than as decoration, and the address ends up doubling as a handle. Check the name reads well after the at sign, because your users will be typing it that way far more often than they type it into a browser.
No. Free privacy applies only to .uk extensions, where Nominet withholds a UK individual registrant's address by default. On .social, as on every generic extension, privacy is a paid add-on you switch on in the My365i control panel. The registration itself includes free DNS management, email forwarding and one free 10GB mailbox.
Usually not, and this is the case we most often argue against. A CIC is asking funders and commissioners to take it seriously, and .org has decades of that behind it at less than half the annual cost. Buy .social if the thing you run really is a network. If social in your name means social good, the .org is the better address and the cheaper one.
Included with Your .social 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 Community Domains Extensions
Register your .social domain today
Secure your .social domain from just £34.99/yr. Free DNS management, email forwarding, and 10GB mailbox included.
