.aid
Is .aid a real TLD? Who’s applying to run it?
.aid is contested: 5 applications for it are on ICANN’s Reveal Day list, as of 8 October 2026. They are Public Interest Registry, GoDaddy Registry, CyberPeace, Starlight (Namecheap) and Aruba. ShortDot named .aid as a backup string for its .hub application. ICANN deactivated it, because another applicant applied for the same string or named it as a backup.
A meaningful word for charities and relief work, but nonprofits already trust .org, so .aid will likely stay a side-project address.
humanitarian and relief organizations, charities, fundraising campaigns, and mutual-aid or assistance services (legal aid, first aid, hearing aid brands) wanting a cause-signaling web address
Aruba S.p.A. told Domain Name Wire it applied for 39 strings in the 2026 round 'as primary or replacement', listing .aid among them without saying which strings are primary. The claim is the applicant's own, post-filing, relayed by the publication. Founder ruling 2026-09-09: recorded as announced. Already on the record from another applicant, so this adds to the contention set.
One of the 80 strings ShortDot published for the ICANN 2026 round. ShortDot states it has submitted 40 applications, but publishes the 80 strings without revealing which 40 are applications and which 40 are designated replacements. The submission claim is therefore applicant-level, not string-level: nothing in the source says ShortDot applied for THIS string. Catalogued, not announced.
The 2012 applications making the most similar bet. Chosen by AI from every string in that round, without being told what happened to any of them.
Same bet: a plain, uncontested generic noun that names an entire mission-driven sector, whose value depends on relief/nonprofit organizations moving their primary identity onto a sector word rather than on registration volume from the open market.
Same bet from the acronym side: a sector-membership label for humanitarian and development organizations, only viable if a credentialed class of institutions adopts it as identity (usually with eligibility vetting), not if it sells broadly.
Same short-generic-assistance-noun bet on the open-registry side — value comes from keyword utility for anyone offering assistance (support desks, services), which is the alternative reading of .aid, but it carries none of the sector-identity/eligibility dynamic.
What a .aid domain is
.aid is not a TLD yet. It is a string on our record of the ICANN 2026 new gTLD round, filed under Culture. 5 applications for it are on ICANN’s Reveal Day list.
Is the .aid domain extension real yet?
.aid is not yet a domain extension you can register: nothing resolves under it, and no registrar sells names in it. It is a string applicants have put forward in the ICANN 2026 new gTLD round, the process that decides whether it becomes one.
When can you buy a .aid domain?
You can’t yet. A .aid name can only be registered once the string is delegated (added to the DNS root) and its registry opens. Last round's closest parallel to .aid was .charity, delegated on 7 June 2018.
Is .aid a real TLD?
Not yet. .aid is not in the DNS root, so nothing resolves under it. It’s here because .aid is on ICANN’s Reveal Day list of applied-for strings. Every entry on this page links to its source.
- Starlight (Namecheap) · noteDomain Name Wire
- ShortDot · now deactivated backupICANN
- ShortDot · now abandonedICANN
- Public Interest Registry · first recordedICANN
- GoDaddy Registry · first recordedICANN
- CyberPeace · first recordedICANN
- Starlight (Namecheap) · first recordedICANN
- Aruba · now confirmedICANN
- ShortDot · now announced
- Aruba · first recordedDomain Name Wire (Andrew Allemann), quoting Aruba S.p.A.
- ShortDot · first recordedShortDot (Ireland) Limited
“AEI2688T-T61051 · Adhara Exploration, Inc. · primary · contention set 2026-8 APEC2611T-T69337 · Aruba PEC S.P.A. · primary · contention set 2026-8 C2595-T79030 · CyberPeace · primary · contention set 2026-8 NA2626T-T65696 · ShortDot (Ireland) Limited · replacement string of .hub · Deactivated NA2631T-T48475 · Registry Services, LLC · primary · contention set 2026-8 PIR2624T-T12017 · Public Interest Registry · primary · contention set 2026-8”ICANN
“AEI2688T-T61051 · Adhara Exploration, Inc. · primary · contention set 2026-8 APEC2611T-T69337 · Aruba PEC S.P.A. · primary · contention set 2026-8 C2595-T79030 · CyberPeace · primary · contention set 2026-8 NA2631T-T48475 · Registry Services, LLC · primary · contention set 2026-8 PIR2624T-T12017 · Public Interest Registry · primary · contention set 2026-8”ICANN
“Aruba S.p.A., which operates the .cloud top level domain, is expanding its domain portfolio. The company told Domain Name Wire that it applied for 39 top level domains in this year's new TLD round. That number includes replacement strings. [...] The company applied for the following strings as primary or replacement: aid, all, ask, beta, bit, bnb, cart, ciao, daily, demo, easy, fix, gaming, gen, genius, gym, happy, hello, hola, human, kit, lab, mars, max, moon, omg, pec, pop, rem, roma, sign, sito, super, tag, tex, vps, yes, zen, zzz”Domain Name Wire (Andrew Allemann), quoting Aruba S.p.A.
“ShortDot (Ireland) Limited has submitted 40 applications to ICANN's 2026 New gTLD Program. The 80 strings shown include applied-for and designated replacement strings across ShortDot's 40 ICANN applications, presented without revealing their status or pairing.”ShortDot (Ireland) Limited
“For us, moving into the registry side is a natural extension of what we have been building.”Domain Name Wire
- I place .aid in the 30-49 band (usable but limited). It clears the 10-29 band because 'aid' is a real English word with a coherent buyer group — relief organizations, charities, disaster-response campaigns — plus suffix-hack appeal (legal.aid, first.aid, mutual.aid), so demand is functional rather than joke-driven. It falls short of the 50-69 band because, by analogy, cause-sector TLDs such as .ngo, .charity, and .foundation have seen thin adoption against the entrenched .org default: nonprofits are conservative brand stewards and donor trust flows to .org, so primary-identity use of .aid over the next 5 years is likely to be rare and campaign-scoped (microsites, appeals) rather than flagship. Backing from a large-registrar-affiliated applicant improves retail distribution odds, which supports volume registrations but not necessarily brand strength or aftermarket depth. Registration counts for .ngo/.charity are unknown to me as verified figures, so this is reasoned qualitatively from analogy. Main market uncertainty: whether major humanitarian brands adopt .aid for high-visibility campaign identities, which would pull it toward strong-niche territory.