My favourite registrars (as a newbie)

[MapleDonut]

I'm new to the domain game but I've already tried using several registrars to try out what each one has the best to offer for me.

Currently, my favourites are:
Epik & dynadot

The Good
-Epik

• Epik's landers look great and they convey a lot of trust with their badges and clean design.
• Easy to use back-end that makes managing everything very quick and natural.
• Fast updates on changes made to landers and other domain info.

-dynadot

• Clean lander that while not having as much customization and added trust badges as Epik, still convey a sense of security.
• Scrolling sidebar: I love having everything in one place and their sidebar is intuitively designed for ease of use.
• Drop down menus: This falls into the sidebar too but even outside of the sidebar, it's great to have everything grouped together in drop downs as opposed to the clickable tabs (or listicles) that the other registrars I've tried have.

The Bad
-Epik

• No fast transfer: Granted, I'm a newbie but this seems like a big hit to me moving down the road especially when I look at where a majority of the $x,xxx+ sales take place.

-dynadot

• Grace deletion: Don't get me wrong, I love having a grace period for anything I buy. But, with dynadot's grace deletion period I can't list domains on the marketplace until it ends. I'm a forgetful runt and I don't want to have to keep checking back to remember when I can finally put a domain up on their marketplace. I'd much prefer if the grace deletion period was in effect but it was still possible to list domains. After all, if it don't sell even in grace deletion then what difference does it make whether or not I wait out the grace deletion period to end. Better yet, if it sells during the grace deletion period I wouldn't have to bother deleting.

Registrars I dislike the most (so far)
NameSilo & GoDaddy

NameSilo

• To their credit, their reg. and ren. fees are great pretty good all across the board from what I've seen. And, they're pretty transparent about their fees and other stuff which I absolutely love. But, their UI is extremely clunky and confusing to navigate.
• For sale landers with no https: What's up with not having https on for sale landers? Consumers want security when making payments. Even if it were just to buy a $0.01 speck of dust, I'd bounce from any site that has a "This site is not secure" pop up.
• Slow updates: The other night, I changed the background image for my lander and update the readable text on the lander. Woke up the next morning to find that the lander still hadn't updated even after I tried viewing on 3 different browsers. In the end, I had to reach out to their support to get someone to update it for me. I thought this was a wild card that came once in a blue moon but I tried making other changes after that and even then, after several more hours of waiting, the changes still hadn't come into effect. Mind you, the changes were only cosmetic (BG image and text) and had nothing to do with anything else.

GoDaddy

• Log-out timer: I've no clue why but GoDaddy always logs me out after every session despite my clicking the remember box every time I login and it's so frustrating. Of all the registrars, one would think that the top dog would have the best tools at their disposal but I guess that isn't always the case.
• Pricing in 3 words: What the hell...

I've also tried a few other registrars but I've still yet to decide whether I like them or not.

 

[Rob Monster]

Thanks for the review. Glad to hear you are liking Epik.

As for Fast-transfer, don't believe the hype. The ability to sell direct, and on Afternic is not reduced. What you lose in convenience, you gain in account security.

Bloggers tell a story that Afternic fast-transfer is somehow important. Before you drink their kool-aid, ask them whether Godaddy paid them directly or indirectly. If they lie to you, that will be on them.

There is plenty of room for everyone in this industry. Scarcity mindset is a trap.