What happens when my domain expires?

This information comes directly from our domain registrar (ENOM).

Problem

What happens if I forget to renew and my domain expires?

Solution

When a domain expires through eNom, it becomes inactive immediately, a parking page is displayed, and all the services attached to it, such as a website and/or email cease to function. It is not possible to make any updates to the domain while it is expired. The domain will remain available for reactivation at your regular domain rate under your list of Expired Domains. To reactivate an expired domain, please see the article, How to Renew Domains (including Bulk Renewal).

Currently, we offer a non-guaranteed 29-day grace period for renewal for many TLDs. Each registry has different rules for their grace periods. There is no guaranteed grace period. Once a domain expires, we may dispose of it at any time according to the registration agreement. After the grace period elapses, the domain may go into a Redemption Grace Period (see Definitions of Redemption and Pending Delete).

We highly recommend that you enable Auto Renew for your domains (see Enable/Disable Auto Renew for Domains). Likewise, we suggest you keep track of your domain expiration dates and renew well in advance to avoid unintentional down time or loss of the name. You can sort your domains by expiration date, or run reports to help aid you with the management of your domain expiration dates (see Transaction History and other Reports). Courtesy emails are sent out 45 days prior to expiration to warn you of the impending expiration. Once you renew the domain, all previous settings will be recovered and the domain will be active (see Propagation Time for Registered and Reactivated Domains).

Renewal years are always added to the end of the current registration period (i.e., the new expiration date is the same whether you renew two months early or the day before expiration), so you will never lose time on your domain by renewing early.

 

What happens after the domain has passed the grace period?

After a domain has passed through any applicable expiration grace period, the domain may go into redemption status.

"Redemption Grace Period" or RGP, is the grace period provided after the registrar has issued a delete request to the registry. Only the previous registrant can recover the domain during this time, and it must be retrieved through the previous registrar. The Redemption Grace Period is named differently for some TLDs; the .org equivalent, for example, is "Pending Delete - Restorable."

Domains in our system can go into either Redemption Grace Period or Extended Redemption Grace Period. Please see the article, Differences between RGP and Extended RGP for more details. For details on how to recover a domain from RGP or ERGP status, please see the article, How to Recover Domains in Redemption Status.

"Pending Delete" refers to the 5-day time frame after redemption. During this time the registry holds the domain and it cannot be recovered. Once the Registry deletes the domain, it becomes available for anyone to purchase as a new domain. It is available on a first-come first-served basis.

To greatly increase your chances of acquiring Pending Delete domains, please create an account with our auction partner, NameJet, and place a backorder on the domain.

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