Short answer: a .co.uk or .com domain usually costs £10 to £20 a year to keep at mainstream UK registrars once VAT and renewal pricing apply. First-year offers can be as low as 1p, and at-cost registrars such as Cloudflare charge about $5 to $11 a year. The catch with domains is never the first year. It is every year after it.
How much does a domain name cost per year?
£10 to £20 a year is the realistic budget for a .co.uk or .com, paid at the renewal price. Introductory deals make the first year look almost free, but they apply once. Here is what the registrars we checked charge for the two extensions most UK businesses buy.
| Registrar | .co.uk first year | .co.uk renewal | .com first year | .com renewal |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| IONOS UK | £1 | £10 | £1 | £15 |
| GoDaddy UK | £0.01 with a 3 year purchase | £12.99 a year for the extra years | £1.99 with a new-customer code | Not shown on the page |
| 123 Reg | £3.99 | Not shown on the page | £0.01, conditions apply | Not shown on the page |
| Namecheap (US dollars) | $6.98 | $9.98 | $11.28 | $18.48 |
| Cloudflare Registrar (US dollars) | $5.30 | $5.30 | $10.46 | $10.46 |
All checked October 2026. IONOS and 123 Reg state their prices exclude VAT, so add 20% if you are not VAT-registered: the IONOS .co.uk renewal of £10 becomes £12, and its .com renewal of £15 becomes £18. Namecheap and Cloudflare price in US dollars, and Namecheap adds ICANN’s $0.20 annual fee to some extensions, including .com.
How much does a .co.uk domain cost?
1p to £4 for the first year at UK registrars running offers, then about £10 to £13 a year before VAT to renew. IONOS renews .co.uk at £10 a year and GoDaddy at £12.99 for each additional year. The .co.uk wholesale side is run by Nominet, which manages more than 10 million .UK domains sold through a network of over 2,000 registrars (Nominet, checked October 2026). You cannot buy from Nominet directly; you always buy through a registrar, which is why the same name can be priced so differently.
If you own a .co.uk, it is often worth registering the matching .uk at the same time. IONOS prices both the same, and Cloudflare charges $5.30 a year for each.
How much does a .com domain cost?
About $10 to $19 a year to renew, or £15 a year before VAT at IONOS. Cloudflare charges $10.46 to register and the same to renew, because it passes on the registry price without a markup. Namecheap’s first year was on sale at $11.28 when we checked, renewing at $18.48. The .com is the safer choice if you sell outside the UK; the .co.uk tells British customers you are local.
How much does a GoDaddy domain cost?
From 1p for the first year of a .co.uk, but only with a 3 year purchase, and each additional year is £12.99. GoDaddy UK was also offering new customers a .com, .co.uk or .uk for £1.99 for one year with a welcome code, with validation at checkout (GoDaddy UK, checked October 2026). Read the term carefully. A 1p headline that needs a three year purchase is really £25.99 over three years at the listed renewal price, before any VAT.
How much does it cost to renew a domain name?
Usually £10 to £20 a year, and often several times the first-year price. 123 Reg explains on its own pricing page that renewal prices are based on the registry’s fees plus its operating costs, and are often higher than registration. The two habits that save money are simple: check the renewal price before you buy, and switch on auto-renew so the name cannot lapse.
If a .UK domain does lapse, Nominet’s rules give you a window. For 30 days after expiry you can still renew it. From day 30 to day 90 it can still be renewed but appears on Nominet’s public drop list. From day 90 to day 95 it can no longer be renewed, and on day 95 it is deleted and anyone can register it (The UK Domain, run by Nominet, checked October 2026). Registrars can suspend services sooner than that, and IONOS charges a £90 restore fee on many extensions. You can renew a .UK name up to 10 years ahead.
How much does it cost to transfer a domain to another registrar?
£0 to £9 at the registrars we checked, depending on the extension. Moving a .co.uk is usually free: Namecheap lists .co.uk transfers at $0.00, 123 Reg advertises free .uk and .co.uk transfers in, and Cloudflare charges nothing to transfer a .uk name, though no extra year is added (Cloudflare docs, checked October 2026). IONOS charges £4 for a .co.uk and £9 for a .com. For most extensions other than .uk, a transfer adds a year to the registration, which is why a .com transfer costs more.
.UK transfers work through an IPS tag rather than the authorisation code used for .com: you ask your current registrar to change the tag to the new one. If your registrar will not do it, Nominet can switch it for you through its Online Services for £10 plus VAT. Passing the domain to a different owner, for example when you sell a business, is a separate registrant transfer, also £10 plus VAT through Nominet (The UK Domain, checked October 2026).
Do I need to pay for domain privacy?
No, not at most of the registrars we checked. GoDaddy UK lists WHOIS privacy protection as free with a domain, Namecheap offers free privacy protection for life, and Cloudflare includes WHOIS redaction. Be wary of any registrar that sells privacy as a paid add-on when it is free elsewhere.
Can you own a domain name permanently?
No. You register a domain for a term, and you keep it for as long as you keep renewing. The longest you can pay ahead for a .UK name is 10 years. If you stop paying, it eventually returns to the open market, so the safest setup is the domain registered in your own name, on auto-renew, with a card that will not expire unnoticed.
Is a domain included when you build my website?
You own it either way. When we build a site, the design, code, domain and content are all yours outright, and the domain should be registered in your name, never ours. Our Starter package at £495 includes hosting setup, and our UK hosting guide explains what the hosting itself costs each year. For the full running-cost picture alongside the build, see our UK website cost guide for 2026.
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