How to renew your domain name?
How to renew your domain name?
You can perform a domain name renewal at any time, for a duration of one year or more.
For more peace of mind with domain renewal, you can enable the automatic renewal option. This means you do not have to worry about your domain name’s expiry date, and you can ensure constant uptime for your cloud hosting project.
Renewing your domain name and your associated services
You can start a domain name renewal operation at any time, directly via the OVHcloud Control Panel. You will then be asked to renew your domain names along with other associated services, such as your web hosting plan. Depending on the solutions you select, you can choose to renew for several months or years.
The renewal will take effect once your payment has been validated. Please note that this does not change the anniversary date of your domain names and/or services. You do not “lose” anything by renewing your products before they expire, and you can avoid any hassle caused by a potential oversight.
Select automatic renewal
If you do not want to worry about your domain name’s expiry date, you can enable automatic domain renewal. By doing this, you can avoid any potential issues caused by unexpected expiry, because your services will be renewed automatically.
Choose the best domain name for your website
Find the right domain name for you, with more than 800 available extensions.
FAQ
How do I renew my domain name?
We have created a guide to assist you with domain name renewal, and web hosting plan renewal. Please refer to it for instructions on how to manually renew your services, or enable automatic renewal:
Why do I need to renew my domain name?
The domain name you have chosen for your website, ecommerce website or hosting package has an expiry date. Have you found the perfect domain name for your project? This means you need to renew it every year (or more, depending on your expiry date), in order to continue using it, and avoid issues associated with expiration, i.e. expiring or expired domain names.
What is a domain name?
Like a home or a store, if you are launching an online business, your website needs an address. This means it can be found on a browser, by entering the URL in the search bar — or via a search engine. A domain name is a web address, which is assigned to the server that hosts the website. A domain name is what visitors use to reach a website without having to memorise its IP address. In the UK, the regulatory authority responsible for administering country-code top-level domain names (ccTLDs) is called Nominet UK. At a global level, ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) is responsible for managing both domain names and IP addresses.
To reserve a domain name, you need to contact a registrar (also known as a registry office). OVHcloud is both a registrar and a hosting provider — so you can reserve a domain name and attach it to your web hosting plan, VPS or dedicated server, wherever it is located. In addition to the essential services, you get a free SSL certificate so that you can make your website accessible in HTTPS.
We offer several hundred domain name extensions, so no matter which sector you are in, you can reserve the right domain name for your project.
Why buy a domain name?
Reserving a domain name is an essential part of building your website, and it is also a vital component in building your online presence. To ensure that web users can access your website directly via a browser or search engine, your website must have a searchable internet address. To be effective, it should be simple and memorable. You can reserve as many domain names as you want, and easily link them to your web hosting plan using DNS (Domain Name System) redirections.
How do I register a domain name?
To register a domain name, you will need to ensure that it has not already been reserved by somebody else. To do this, go to our domain name registration service, then enter the domain name and extension you want to register. If it is available, or is a new domain name, you simply need to place an order and register your domain name under your name, or your company’s name. Domain registration is easy with OVHcloud, as is checking available domains – and we take care of the domain management.
How do I know if a domain name is available?
At first glance, a domain name that does not display a website may seem available, but it could still be reserved by someone. You can check whether it is available by searching it on our tool. If it is not available, you can choose from a selection of several hundred other extensions.
The different statuses are listed below:
- Domain name available for registration. You can reserve it.
- Domain name not available for registration. It has been registered, which means somebody else has already reserved it.
- Domain name transferable. You can transfer it from your current domain name registrar to OVHcloud.
When you decide on a domain name, we advise checking its availability with the Intellectual Property Office (IPO), to see whether it has been registered as a trade mark. If the domain has been registered, you will not be able to use it legally. You can also protect your domain name by registering your brand as a trademark.
How do I find a domain name owner?
You can find information on a domain name holder by performing a Whois search, otherwise known as a Whois lookup. You can do this using our tool: WHOIS
You will see details like the registrant (domain name owner) name, registry name, the domain name contacts, and other elements such as the domain name’s current status and expiry date.
Can I transfer a domain name to OVHcloud?
Yes — at any time, you can transfer a domain name name currently managed by another registrar to OVHcloud. For domain transfer to proceed smoothly, the domain name must not be expired or locked. Our transfer domain page gives a step-by-step breakdown of everything you need to be aware of when transferring a website domain to another registrar.
Find a domain name for your business
Choosing a domain name can be a tricky task. Several hundred million domain names are already reserved, and used worldwide — so you need to consider whether the domain name you choose is available, and how relevant it is to your project. If the domain you want already has a domain owner, you will need to find an alternative internet domain so that your web users can find you. Otherwise, you can find out about domain ownership details via a domain Whois search, then get in touch with the current owner to check whether you can buy a domain name off them. You can find more details on this below, in the ‘domain name market’ section below. Generally, a generic domain name with competitive keywords will already be reserved, or it may only be available on the secondary market — further information on this is also available below. For this reason, when you register your brand, it is important to ensure that your trade name or company name is available to reserve as a domain name. It is usually the easiest name to assign to your web address, and one that your visitors will easily remember.Keep in mind that your domain name should be short, and easy to understand — it must be memorable for visitors and customers.You can reserve several domain names and subdomains to suit your web-presence, and redirect to the server your website is hosted on.
The domain name market
Of the hundreds of millions of domain names that are already in circulation, some are very popular. There is a secondary market for the purchase of domain names put up for sale by their current holders. The most generic domains can sell at very high prices, depending on the sector they are linked to. The price is set by the seller, and generally takes the commercial potential of this domain name into account. One of the most popular SEO strategies is to buy back a domain name, which enables the new holder to benefit from its longevity.