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Owning a domain name typically costs between $10 and $20 a year, but this is just a drop in the ocean in terms of a potential price tag, new data has revealed.
Top web hosting (opens in new tab) company Hostinger (opens in new tab) released a survey of the top seven most expensive domain names in history, with the most expensive domain costing $30 million in 2019.
Voice.com was purchased by a team of technologists, artists and curators from enterprise analytics and software company MicroStrategy, with Hostinger’s data suggesting the transaction was not great value for money based on the site’s monthly traffic numbers (88, 8,000 a month).
Top dollar domains
The top seven websites cost $109 million combined and include the domain names: 360.com, NFTs.com, Sex.com, Fund.com, Hotels.com, and Tesla.com.
The domain name 360.com was owned by Chinese internet security company 360 Security Technology, but was bought by Vodafone in 2015 for $17 million.
Comparable Web data shows traffic significantly outperforming the most expensive domain with 23.9 million monthly visitors, making it the 154th largest website in China.
In addition, the Sex.com domain name was sold from Escom to Clover Holdings in November 2010 after it won an auction.
Currently, the domain name receives more traffic than the rest of the top five sites combined, with 64 million visitors per month, and it’s currently for sale, with minimum bids of $20 million to date.
“It’s fascinating to see how much money has been exchanged for specific domain names – the cost of the seven names in the list is over $100 million,” said a Hostinger spokesperson.
“For billion-dollar companies, the expense is relatively small, especially if it ensures your web presence, strengthens your brand, and ensures a good flow of traffic to your site. But as this study shows, spending millions of dollars on the domain name does not guarantee millions of website visitors.”
As for Tesla.com, CEO Elon Musk previously said it took him a decade to buy the domain from Silicon Valley engineer Stuart Grossman for about $11 million.