In recognition of the 15th anniversary of general availability of the .me domain extension, I thought it was a good time to look at the performance, use and sales record for the extension.
The registry has a 15th Anniversary promotion on – you can read about the anniversary in a blog post on their site.
The Country Code for Montenegro
Officially, .me is the country code extension for Montenegro, although it has always also been promoted for websites with a personal flavour drawing on the me association.
While the extension was introduced in September 2007, the landrush period, when a number of excellent matches across the dot were sold, started in June 2008, hence the 15 year anniversary. General availability began on 17 July 2008.
In the first day, over 50,000 names were registered. Today there are almost 1.2 million .me registrations.
The registry for .me operates at domain.me in English, or domen.me in Montenegran. The registry site makes an effective case for users considering the extension. The Why .ME? button at the top provides a concise 4-point summary.
Sales Record
What about .me as a domain investment? At time of this analysis, there were, according to NameBio, more than 3200 sales from the .me TLD, with a total sales dollar volume of more than $6.4 million. The average price was $1956, but keep in mind this is a mix of wholesale acquisitions along with retail sales.
One has to be careful in using NameBio for long-term trend studies, as the venues reported in NameBio, and the market share of different venues, both change somewhat over time. Nevertheless, I had a look at how the dollar volume changed from year to year. I included only sales at prices of $500 and up to concentrate on the retail market.
I prorated the data for 2023, assuming the early 2023 sales rate will continue for the rest of the year. The dollar volume peaked in 2011, when more than $1.5 million in .me sales ($500 and up, and reported on NameBio) took place, off the scale of the graph. The last four years have been relatively constant in dollar volume.
I also had a look at how the average price varied with year.
The opening year of 2008 was off the graph, with an average of more than $11,000 driven by the release of premium names. Since about 2013 the average price has not varied much.
Most Major Sales Single Words That Combine Well With Me
The highest value .me sale recorded in NameBio is
Just.me is used for a site allowing users to consolidate their links.
Sponsor.me is a crowd funding site catering to the needs of sports teams and organizations.
Call.me, another 5-figure sales, is a messaging service.
Lucky.me sold for 5-figures at Sedo last month, and is in use for a casino games site.
A number of the big sales are either for sale again or parked, or underused, or not used at all. This trend was also found for other extensions.
If searching for single word .me domain names available to register, the One Word Domains is a helpful starting point. You need a lifetime membership to access.
First Names
There is also use of the extension for personal and influencer sites, or brands based on a name, with the structure
The sites are not always personal sites, though. For example,
If considering investing in a first name .me domain name, consider the global popularity of that name. If you have access to Domain Academy, there is a tool to check this for US population.
Product And Service Names
A number of product and service names have sold for strong prices, even if the expression across the dot is not natural. For example, insurance, cloud, hotels, champagne and life insurance all sold for 4 or 5 figures.
Multiple Word Sales Rare
Major sales involving multiple words are rare. Many of those that did sell, although technically two words, are really one idea, sales such as Las Vegas, New York, Real Estate, Online Casino, Speed Test and Credit Card.
Not Many Hyphens or Numbers
Of the 1545 sales of .me at prices of $500 or more recorded in NameBio, only 8 had a hyphen, and only 41 were numeric or alphanumeric.
Use Statistics For .ME
To have long term value as investments, an extension needs to find significant authentic use.
One metric related to use is how many sites in a Google search use the TLD, that is
Placing the number in wider perspective, a similar check indicated 279 million for .io, 400 million for .co, about 305 million for .tv, almost 16 million for .gg, just over 5 million for .vc, and about 6 million for .so.
These are dwarfed by the legacy extensions, with 2.2 billion for .net and 25.2 billion for .com. But .me leads even the more popular new gTLDs, with, about 100 million for .xyz and 102 million for .online.
A possibly more valid way to estimate popularity, is to use Cisco Umbrella statistics based on global requests to resolve domain names. When I looked at this last in 2021, .me did well, placing 9th among all extensions, just below .us and just above .uk and .co.uk combined. The .me extension trailed the legacy extensions and .io, .co and .tv, but was more used, at that time, than every single new extension, and the vast majority of country code extensions.
We no longer have updated Alexa 1M statistics, but when I looked in 2021, there were just over 2000 .me sites in the one million, 16th place globally among all extensions, at that time just below .xyz by that metric, but ahead of .tv.
By any of the use measures .me has significant use, among the better country code extensions, and better than all or almost all new and national country code extensions.
Short Form Redirection
Until researching this article, I had not realized how frequently very short .me names are used as shortcuts to sites. Here are just a few of the many examples:
Used In Domain Hacks
Since a fair number of words end in me, the extension finds significant use in domain hacks where the dot splits a word.
Several high-profile companies use an .me in this way, for example Lime, the world’s largest shared electric vehicle, e-bikes and e-scooters, company. A few years ago they moved from a .com name to
Another high profile company that uses a hack based on .me is Frame. This company, started in 2012, provides services to allow any application to run within a cloud-based browser. They operate on
I am not sure if it meets the rigorous definition of a domain hack, but another high profile company using .me is Ele.me. Apparently in Chinese the meaning of the term is roughly ‘Are you hungry?’ Ele.me started as a food delivery company in 2008, becoming the largest in China, some rank it second currently. While initially food only, Ele.me have expanded to delivering a variety of items and services. They were acquired by Alibaba in 2018.
When searching for domain hacks you can use TheFreeDictionary to find words that end in me, here is a direct link for me, it seems that all, or almost all, are already registered.
Accepted At BrandBucket
While their acceptance standard is high, the BrandBucket marketplace is open to submissions of .me domain names. This provides a possible sales venue for high-worth names suited to brand use. The only other extensions BrandBucket handles are .com, .io and .ly.
Marketplaces and Networks
You can list .me names at Dan, Afternic and Sedo. The extension does qualify for the Dan-Afternic integration, but .me is not accepted for the Afternic Fast Transfer network. The .me extension is eligible for the Sedo MLS network.
Most Single Words, 8 Letters Or Less
I also looked at the $500 or more sales in .me from NameBio in terms of the length of the name. As can be seen, most sales are from names 8 letters or fewer.
I also took a look at how the average price varied with domain length, again including only sales $500 and up. Other than a peak for 4-character names, the average price is fairly constant across a number of different lengths.
Interesting to see that 4-letter are higher even than 3-letter. There is a drop in average price past 8-letter names, another reason to focus on shorter words.
Promotional Pricing And A Contest
To celebrate the 15 year anniversary there is promotional pricing on right now at a number of registrars. Use a resource like TLD-List to find a good price with a registrar that you prefer to use.
They also have a giveaway contest – read about it here.
While please don’t use it as a venue for promoting your .me domain names, if you have an interesting .me sale story to share, or wish to indicate just one of your .me domain names that you think is particularly well suited to the extension, please feel free to mention it in the discussion below.
Also, of course, share your opinions on the extension itself.
The .ME discussion and showcase on NamePros was started in 2008, and now stretched through 286 pages. It is interesting reading, especially to read domain investors attitudes from the launch year about the future of the extension.
My sincere thanks to NameBio for the sales data accessed for this article. Just to be clear, I was not approached or encouraged by the .me registry to do this article, and did not contact them. The .ME registry blog post and site were helpful resources in researching this article.
The registry has a 15th Anniversary promotion on – you can read about the anniversary in a blog post on their site.
The Country Code for Montenegro
Officially, .me is the country code extension for Montenegro, although it has always also been promoted for websites with a personal flavour drawing on the me association.
While the extension was introduced in September 2007, the landrush period, when a number of excellent matches across the dot were sold, started in June 2008, hence the 15 year anniversary. General availability began on 17 July 2008.
In the first day, over 50,000 names were registered. Today there are almost 1.2 million .me registrations.
The registry for .me operates at domain.me in English, or domen.me in Montenegran. The registry site makes an effective case for users considering the extension. The Why .ME? button at the top provides a concise 4-point summary.
Sales Record
What about .me as a domain investment? At time of this analysis, there were, according to NameBio, more than 3200 sales from the .me TLD, with a total sales dollar volume of more than $6.4 million. The average price was $1956, but keep in mind this is a mix of wholesale acquisitions along with retail sales.
One has to be careful in using NameBio for long-term trend studies, as the venues reported in NameBio, and the market share of different venues, both change somewhat over time. Nevertheless, I had a look at how the dollar volume changed from year to year. I included only sales at prices of $500 and up to concentrate on the retail market.
I prorated the data for 2023, assuming the early 2023 sales rate will continue for the rest of the year. The dollar volume peaked in 2011, when more than $1.5 million in .me sales ($500 and up, and reported on NameBio) took place, off the scale of the graph. The last four years have been relatively constant in dollar volume.
I also had a look at how the average price varied with year.
The opening year of 2008 was off the graph, with an average of more than $11,000 driven by the release of premium names. Since about 2013 the average price has not varied much.
Most Major Sales Single Words That Combine Well With Me
The highest value .me sale recorded in NameBio is
Meet.me, a private sale for $450,000 in 2011. Today that name redirects to the matching .com. Most of the top sales were of this nature, a single word that combines with me to make a common expression.Join.me has been acquire by GoTo, a collaboration and web conferencing company, and now redirects there.Just.me is used for a site allowing users to consolidate their links.
Sponsor.me is a crowd funding site catering to the needs of sports teams and organizations.
Call.me, another 5-figure sales, is a messaging service.
Lucky.me sold for 5-figures at Sedo last month, and is in use for a casino games site.
Tip:
Use a Google search in quotation marks as one metric of how well a term combines with me.
Sail.me is an example of a phrase that is not the most common, but still sold for 5-figures in 2019 at Sedo. The name redirects to the com, although they seem to use the .me in their primary branding. It is a boat and yacht rental company.A number of the big sales are either for sale again or parked, or underused, or not used at all. This trend was also found for other extensions.
If searching for single word .me domain names available to register, the One Word Domains is a helpful starting point. You need a lifetime membership to access.
First Names
There is also use of the extension for personal and influencer sites, or brands based on a name, with the structure
NAME.me. It seems that first names are much more common than surnames.The sites are not always personal sites, though. For example,
Noah.me redirects to the cryptocurrency site Noah.com. That name sold in 2022 by Booth for $35,000.If considering investing in a first name .me domain name, consider the global popularity of that name. If you have access to Domain Academy, there is a tool to check this for US population.
Tip:
To find how popular a name is globally, use the free tool Forebears.io. The site will show you for different countries the popularity of the name, with rank, ratio and incidence data.
Product And Service Names
A number of product and service names have sold for strong prices, even if the expression across the dot is not natural. For example, insurance, cloud, hotels, champagne and life insurance all sold for 4 or 5 figures.
Multiple Word Sales Rare
Major sales involving multiple words are rare. Many of those that did sell, although technically two words, are really one idea, sales such as Las Vegas, New York, Real Estate, Online Casino, Speed Test and Credit Card.
Not Many Hyphens or Numbers
Of the 1545 sales of .me at prices of $500 or more recorded in NameBio, only 8 had a hyphen, and only 41 were numeric or alphanumeric.
Use Statistics For .ME
To have long term value as investments, an extension needs to find significant authentic use.
One metric related to use is how many sites in a Google search use the TLD, that is
site:.me. On the day I checked, for .me 331 million sites, slightly more than for .io.Placing the number in wider perspective, a similar check indicated 279 million for .io, 400 million for .co, about 305 million for .tv, almost 16 million for .gg, just over 5 million for .vc, and about 6 million for .so.
These are dwarfed by the legacy extensions, with 2.2 billion for .net and 25.2 billion for .com. But .me leads even the more popular new gTLDs, with, about 100 million for .xyz and 102 million for .online.
A possibly more valid way to estimate popularity, is to use Cisco Umbrella statistics based on global requests to resolve domain names. When I looked at this last in 2021, .me did well, placing 9th among all extensions, just below .us and just above .uk and .co.uk combined. The .me extension trailed the legacy extensions and .io, .co and .tv, but was more used, at that time, than every single new extension, and the vast majority of country code extensions.
We no longer have updated Alexa 1M statistics, but when I looked in 2021, there were just over 2000 .me sites in the one million, 16th place globally among all extensions, at that time just below .xyz by that metric, but ahead of .tv.
By any of the use measures .me has significant use, among the better country code extensions, and better than all or almost all new and national country code extensions.
Short Form Redirection
Until researching this article, I had not realized how frequently very short .me names are used as shortcuts to sites. Here are just a few of the many examples:
- FB in the .me extension takes you to Facebook.
- Paypal promote their PP.me shortcut.
- Wonder where Go.me redirects? A site well known to domain investors!
- Not to be outdone, NC.me is a short link for Namecheap.
- Use Telegram? the single letter T domain in the .me extension takes you there.
- Can you guess where G.me might go?
- WA.me goes to WhatsApp.
Used In Domain Hacks
Since a fair number of words end in me, the extension finds significant use in domain hacks where the dot splits a word.
Several high-profile companies use an .me in this way, for example Lime, the world’s largest shared electric vehicle, e-bikes and e-scooters, company. A few years ago they moved from a .com name to
li.me.Another high profile company that uses a hack based on .me is Frame. This company, started in 2012, provides services to allow any application to run within a cloud-based browser. They operate on
fra.me.I am not sure if it meets the rigorous definition of a domain hack, but another high profile company using .me is Ele.me. Apparently in Chinese the meaning of the term is roughly ‘Are you hungry?’ Ele.me started as a food delivery company in 2008, becoming the largest in China, some rank it second currently. While initially food only, Ele.me have expanded to delivering a variety of items and services. They were acquired by Alibaba in 2018.
When searching for domain hacks you can use TheFreeDictionary to find words that end in me, here is a direct link for me, it seems that all, or almost all, are already registered.
Accepted At BrandBucket
While their acceptance standard is high, the BrandBucket marketplace is open to submissions of .me domain names. This provides a possible sales venue for high-worth names suited to brand use. The only other extensions BrandBucket handles are .com, .io and .ly.
Marketplaces and Networks
You can list .me names at Dan, Afternic and Sedo. The extension does qualify for the Dan-Afternic integration, but .me is not accepted for the Afternic Fast Transfer network. The .me extension is eligible for the Sedo MLS network.
Most Single Words, 8 Letters Or Less
I also looked at the $500 or more sales in .me from NameBio in terms of the length of the name. As can be seen, most sales are from names 8 letters or fewer.
I also took a look at how the average price varied with domain length, again including only sales $500 and up. Other than a peak for 4-character names, the average price is fairly constant across a number of different lengths.
Interesting to see that 4-letter are higher even than 3-letter. There is a drop in average price past 8-letter names, another reason to focus on shorter words.
Promotional Pricing And A Contest
To celebrate the 15 year anniversary there is promotional pricing on right now at a number of registrars. Use a resource like TLD-List to find a good price with a registrar that you prefer to use.
They also have a giveaway contest – read about it here.
While please don’t use it as a venue for promoting your .me domain names, if you have an interesting .me sale story to share, or wish to indicate just one of your .me domain names that you think is particularly well suited to the extension, please feel free to mention it in the discussion below.
Also, of course, share your opinions on the extension itself.
The .ME discussion and showcase on NamePros was started in 2008, and now stretched through 286 pages. It is interesting reading, especially to read domain investors attitudes from the launch year about the future of the extension.
My sincere thanks to NameBio for the sales data accessed for this article. Just to be clear, I was not approached or encouraged by the .me registry to do this article, and did not contact them. The .ME registry blog post and site were helpful resources in researching this article.
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