A generic top-level domain (gTLD) is an extension that is not tied to a specific country. The original group from the 1980s included .com, .net, .org, .edu, .gov and .mil, with more such as .info and .biz added in the early 2000s.
Most gTLDs are governed by contracts with ICANN, which means registrars and registries must follow ICANN-wide policies on transfers, WHOIS/registration data, dispute resolution (UDRP) and expiration handling. This makes gTLD rules more consistent than ccTLD rules.
Since 2013, ICANN’s New gTLD Program has added more than a thousand extensions, ranging from generic words (.shop, .app) to brand TLDs (.google) and city names (.nyc, .london).
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Related terms
- New gTLD
- New gTLDs are the hundreds of extensions introduced by ICANN since 2013, such as .app, .shop, .xyz, .online and .dev, expanding naming options.
- Second-level domain (SLD)
- The second-level domain is the part directly left of the TLD, such as "example" in example.com, and is usually the name you register.
- Subdomain
- A subdomain is a label added before your domain, like blog.example.com or shop.example.com, that you create free in your own DNS settings.
- Registrar
- A registrar is a company accredited to sell and manage domain registrations on behalf of customers, such as Namecheap, Porkbun or Cloudflare.