Reglikedomain industry desk

Registrar ratings

Web site offers consumer reviews of domain registrars.

Everyone has their horror story. The registrar that suddenly changed the DNS on their domains. The registrar that loses their domain in the system so it can’t be edited. The registrar that won’t unlock their domains.

Here’s a cool site to read regarding other users’ experiences with over 20 registrars: domainsbot.com/rate-registrar.aspx. Users rate registrars on four aspects counting ease, price, services, and offerings. So far no registrars have more than 20 reviews, but I think the ratings are fairly accurate.

For example, 1&1 Internet has a good rating on price (they offer $5.99 registration), but poor ratings on ease and services (it’s hard to transfer domains out and manage domains since 1&1 is ultimately a webhost, not a domain service). Network Solutions and RegisterFly are rated rather poor across the board, which jives with most users’ experiences.

Anyone can rate registrars, but you must register for a free account. All reviews are held for moderation ahead of being posted. This ought to help prevent ballot stuffing by registrars.

I have a couple thoughts for improving the site:

1. Clarify “services” vs. “offerings”. The way I read it, there’s no rating for client service, but perhaps that’s what “services” is supposed to be.

2. Remove registrars that are mostly brokerages, such as Afternic and Sedo. Most of the reviews regarding these firms are actually regarding their brokerage services, so it skews results. At a minimum they ought to be moved to a fresh category called “rate a brokerage”.

Also on the wire

Other reporting from the domain desk.

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