SA domain names: co.za vs web.za, net.za, org.za

There are currently 969,190 registered domain names ending in .za, South Africa’s designation in cyberspace, and the country is set to reach the one million mark in the first quarter of 2015. This is according to Lucky Masilela, CEO of the ZA Central Registry (ZACR).

Of the 969,190 .za domains, co.za accounts for 942,755 of them, while web.za, net.za, and org.za accounted for the rest.

The number of registered .za domains is particularly impressive if one considers that there are currently just over 60 000 registered .ng (Nigeria) domains.

Helping to boost the number of .za registered domain names are more than 400 registrars in South Africa and abroad who register domains.

Masilela revealed that 15.8% of registrars registering .za domains were located outside of South Africa (about 62 registrars are foreign). He said that 34 registrars were in Europe and 16 in North America.

Foreign registrars account for 6.8% of co.za domain name registrations (some 57,000 domain names).

When it came to the geographic spread within South Africa, there were 166 registrars in Gauteng, 106 in the Western Cape, and 39 in KwaZulu-Natal.

ZACR currently administers co.za, org.za, web.za, and net.za, while the ZADotCities domains of .joburg (dotJoburg), .capetown (dotCapeTown), and .durban (dotDurban) are set to enter the General Availability phase in November.

ZACR is also set to administer the planned .africa (dotAfrica) geoTLD once Internet regulator ICANN (the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) overcomes certain regulatory challenges.

More on domain names

First ever co.za domain names in South Africa

Number of co.za domain names revealed

Co.za domain name registrations made easy, for free