If your customers are the general public, get the .com, or a name you can get in .com; it is the extension people type by default and it carries 69% of reported domain sales and 77% of the dollars. If you sell to developers, run an AI company, or serve one country, .io, .ai or your country code can work, with two costs: some email and traffic will leak to the .com owner, and the .com will be more expensive if you need it later.
Short answer: you need a .com if people will hear your name before they see it. Radio, podcasts, word of mouth, a conference stage: every one of those sends the listener to yourname.com, and if that is not you, it is your competitor or a parking page. If your customers only ever click a link, a well-chosen alternative extension is a legitimate choice with known costs.
Below: what the sales data says about each extension, how the decision changes by business type, and the two costs of not owning the .com.
Publicly reported sales of $100 or more, 2024 to 2026, brought to 2025 dollars. The median is of names that sold, so it describes the strong names in each extension, not the average registration.
| Extension | Reported sales | Median sale | Read it as |
|---|---|---|---|
| .com | 17,193 | $4,953 | The market. 69% of all reported sales, 77% of the dollars. |
| .ai | 1,379 | $9,100 | Strong AI words sell at .com-like prices. Weak words do not sell at all. |
| .org | 1,985 | $4,824 | Nonprofits, communities, causes. Respected, rarely a startup choice. |
| .io | 364 | $6,244 | Developer tools and SaaS. Unknown to the general public. |
| .co | 328 | $6,000 | The usual ".com was taken" fallback, and everyone knows it. |
| .net | 559 | $4,542 | Old, trusted, and permanently second to the .com. |
| .de | 663 | $4,181 | The strongest country code market; the norm for German businesses. |
The counts matter as much as the medians. Seventeen thousand .com sales against a few hundred in most other extensions means the .com market is deep and liquid, and the others are thin: easier to buy into, harder to sell out of.
Consumer brand, retail, services to the public. Get the .com. If your first-choice word is out of reach, choose a different word you can own in .com rather than the perfect word in a different extension. Your customers will type .com whatever you print.
AI company. .ai is accepted and expected. Buy the .com too if it is affordable; if it is not, make sure the .com owner is not a competitor and is not likely to become one.
Developer tool, API, infrastructure. .io, .dev and .ai all work, because your users find you through documentation, package managers and search, not through typing a name they heard. Plan to buy the .com when you raise money; it will cost more then, and you will be able to pay it.
Local business in one country. The country code is right and cheaper. Register the .com defensively if it is available for the registration fee; do not pay aftermarket prices for it unless you are expanding.
Nonprofit, community, open source. .org carries meaning the others do not. Pair it with the .com if the name is generic enough to be confused with a business.
Appraise both candidates: the .com you would have to buy, and the alternative you can register or buy cheaply. The .com's retail range tells you what the market thinks the name is worth to a business like yours. If that figure is small next to a year of marketing spend, buy it and stop thinking about it. If it is a large multiple, pick an extension your customers will not have to remember, and build the brand on the name rather than the ending.
For AI companies, yes, and it is now the extension investors and customers expect. In 2024 to 2026 the median reported .ai sale was about $9,100 across 1,379 sales, higher than .com, because the .ai names that sell are strong AI words with real demand. That does not make a weak word in .ai valuable; it makes a strong one competitive with its .com.
Well established with developers and fine for a product that developers find on their own. The median reported .io sale was about $6,200. Risks: the general public does not know it, and .io is a country code (British Indian Ocean Territory) whose future is a matter of policy rather than market.
Usually yes. A German business on .de, a British one on .co.uk or an Australian one on .com.au is what local customers expect, and the names are far cheaper than .com. The median reported .de sale was about $4,200. The trade-off appears only when the business expands beyond the country.
Many companies do, and many pay dearly for it. Once your brand is visible, the .com owner knows exactly who the buyer is and what the name is worth to you. If you can afford the .com now at anything near its appraisal, that is almost always the cheaper moment.
For a consumer brand, often yes. A coined or two-word .com you own outright beats sharing a perfect word with the .com owner. The test is whether customers can spell it after hearing it once. An appraisal of both candidates shows which one the market thinks has the wider buyer pool.
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