ccTLD Third level Spanish domains

[Gerrit]

Here in Spain .es is very popular (exceptions are the separatist areas Catalonia and Basque Country to some extent but even there .es is used). The price is low and registrations have been opened for foreigners a few years back.

The price for a third level domain is even lower. While an .es domain is a little above 6 euro when I last checked, a .com.es domain was only about 3 euro per year, one of the cheapest extentions in the EU.

I wonder though, given the popularity of .es proper and given the fact that .com.es is rarely seen in advertisements ... is it likely that .com.es will continue to exist on the long term, or is there a realistic risk that third level domains would be made defunct since the .es proper is now widely available?

It is quite a tough one because look at India and China: even now that .cn and .in are widely available and for a low price, .co.in and .com.cn are still widely used and don't seem to suffer from the availability of the second level domains.

Is .com.es a safe registration or would it be risky on the long haul? I know the second level .es is only a few euros more, but .com.es can still be interesting when the second level .es is already registered or when you want to register several Spanish domains (in that case the price difference does make a difference)

 

[Kate]

I would not go for .com.es.
It's not like in other countries where the third level is still more popular. Even then, I would want the second level equivalent to secure my future.
I don't think .com.es will be scrapped, it's just that it will become less relevant.
It's the same in other extensions, even in .uk there are unpopular third levels such as .net.uk or me.uk.

 

[Gerrit]

For sure .com.es is less used here in Spain than .es properly. It is cheaper though, so when wanting to register a higher number of Spanish domains it can save quite a bit of euro's. Registering 10 .com.es domains would probably cost about the same as 5 .es domains last time I checked the average prices.

I must add that in the 1.5 year of residing here in Spain I only saw one .com.es in advertisements. Most local companies register .es (and in Catalonia they often opt for .cat as well but as I don't speak Catalan I'm only after regular Spanish domains). I do see that in countries with both options available, that the releasing of second level does not always imply the downgrading of the value of third level, .co.in and .com.cn are still used frequently for example.

I would be mainly worried weither .com.es would continue to exist for the forseeable future with .es now widely available without restrictions. That said, popularity-wise you are right that .es will always be a better choice.