.chopstick
Is .chopstick a real TLD? Who’s applying to run it?
Nobody is chasing .chopstick, as of 7 October 2026. One applicant claimed it and is out. We keep the entry on the record either way.
- Journey To The West
A playful food-themed domain; a few Asian restaurants and utensil brands might grab one, but almost none would make it their main address.
asian-cuisine restaurants and takeout brands named "Chopstick(s)", chopstick and kitchenware makers, and food bloggers wanting a novelty address rather than a primary identity
In Journey To The West's published portfolio of 323 strings submitted in the ICANN 2026 round. Their catalog line: “The simplest tool, mastered by a billion hands.”
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 single, narrow, culturally-coded everyday consumable/utensil noun asked to carry a whole trade's identity, where the registrant pool is producers, sellers and enthusiasts of literally one item rather than a broad industry.
Same bet in string-type terms: a hyper-specific singular food-table common noun whose natural registrant base is tiny, so it only works if the word's cultural pull and evocative reach exceed its literal commercial market.
Shares the culturally-coded dining-signal job — buyers adopt it to mark a cuisine/food tradition rather than to describe their product — but it is a certification and identity term for a defined community, not a physical object anyone manufactures or sells.
What a .chopstick domain is
.chopstick is not a TLD yet. It is a string on our record of the ICANN 2026 new gTLD round, in our Culture category. Nobody is chasing .chopstick today. The applicants that claimed it are out.
Is the .chopstick domain extension real yet?
.chopstick is not yet a domain extension you can register: nothing resolves under it, and no registrar sells names in it. Nobody has applied for it on the public record; the ICANN 2026 new gTLD round is the process that would decide whether it becomes one.
When can you buy a .chopstick domain?
You can’t yet. A .chopstick 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 .chopstick was .vodka, delegated on 31 March 2014.
Is .chopstick a real TLD?
Not yet. .chopstick is not in the DNS root, so nothing resolves under it. It’s here because an applicant claimed .chopstick and is no longer in it. We keep the entry, and every entry on this page links to its source.
- Journey To The West · now abandonedICANN
- Journey To The West · first recordedJourney To The West Corporation
“.chopstick · Cuisine · “The simplest tool, mastered by a billion hands.””Journey To The West Corporation
- I place .chopstick in the 10-29 vanity/narrow band, near its floor. It is above the 1-9 band because a real (if tiny) buyer pool exists — restaurants branded 'Chopsticks' are common worldwide and utensil sellers could use it for campaign or vanity sites. It is below the 30-49 band because, by analogy with narrow food-word gTLDs such as .sushi and .pizza (flagged as analogy — I have no verified figures), single-food-object strings have historically drawn thin, price-driven registration with little primary-identity use; a singular utensil noun is narrower still, and the English singular clashes with the plural branding most restaurants use. The applicant is one of 323 strings in a published portfolio (per the facts block), which typically implies volume/speculative positioning rather than a cultivated vertical community — stated neutrally, it informs adoption likelihood only. My main market uncertainty is whether food-and-beverage businesses in the next 5 years shift meaningfully toward descriptive TLD identities at all; a broad shift would lift this string somewhat, though the singular/plural mismatch would still cap it.