.agent, .lab(s), .bit: Most contested top level domains

Unofficially, these TLDs have the most applicants.

Today, ICANN released the full list of 1,616 fresh top level domain name applications it received this year.

The most-contested sting is no surprise: .agent is at the top of the list.

But two things are immediately surprising.

First, only five firms applied for .crypto. Many had that high on their list for most-contested.

Second, .agent is tied for first. The .lab/.labs contention set also has 13 applicants.

ICANN hasn’t formally stated which domains are in contention. But looking at the strings and combining the singulars and plurals (which will be in contention), here’s what I come up with:

.agent – 13 applications – Some real heavyweights in the battle, too. Google, Meta, OpenAI.

.lab / .labs – 13 applications (7 + 6) – I think domains ending in lab.com have more registrations, but modern firms are choosing labs.

.bit – 11 applications – This would have been a surprise had lots of firms not pre-disclosed it. Two firms applied for bitcoin. .Bit by itself could relate to things other than bitcoin.

.api – 10 applications – No surprise here; I always had this high on my list.

.brand – 10 applications – A bit of a surprise to me, but the business model could be protective registrations.

.hub – 10 applications – Also no surprise to me.

.pop – 9 applications – What’s the use case here? Email?

.robot – 9 applications

.good / .goods – 9 applications (6 + 3), from 8 applicants (one applied for both)

.max – 8 applications – A bit surprising to me

.official – 8 applications – Another good play for defensive registrations

.pod – 8 applications – This is the one string I toyed with applying for, given my background having run and later sold a podcast business. I’m not surprised to see so many applications. The market challenge is that it will compete for registrations with .podcast, which has three applications.

.zen – 8 applications

.agi – 7 applications

.ask – 7 applications

.connect – 7 applications

.firm – 7 applications

.key – 7 applications

.mind – 7 applications

.therapy – 7 applications

.vibe – 7 applications – This could be vibe coding or just a cool word people will want to brand with. The latter is obviously bigger.