.scam
Is .scam a real TLD? Who’s applying to run it?
.scam is not contested. One application for it is on ICANN’s Reveal Day list, as of 7 October 2026. It is XYZ.
A word no brand wants beside its name; useful only for scam-warning sites, parody, and defensive blocks.
scam-awareness publishers, consumer watchdogs and fraud-reporting services, satire and parody sites, and brands registering defensively to keep "brand.scam" out of others' 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 exactly: a pejorative English word nobody puts their own identity on, whose entire demand comes from critics attaching a brand's name to it and from that brand paying to block or own the accusation.
Also an accusation word used as a predicate on someone else's name (target.exposed), monetized by watchdog/callout publishing plus defensive takeup, though it frames investigation rather than naming a specific crime.
Same consumer-grievance category bet on a word with negative valence, but it is the complainer's own voice rather than a charge levelled at a named target, so registrants are platforms instead of defending brands.
What a .scam domain is
.scam is not a TLD yet. It is a string on our record of the ICANN 2026 new gTLD round, filed under Culture. One application for it is on ICANN’s Reveal Day list.
Is the .scam domain extension real yet?
.scam 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 .scam domain?
You can’t yet. ICANN publishes every applied-for string on Reveal Day, 7 October 2026 at 18:00 UTC. A .scam name can only be registered after that, once the string is delegated and its registry opens. Last round's closest parallel to .scam was .sucks, delegated on 25 February 2015.
Is .scam a real TLD?
Not yet. .scam is not in the DNS root, so nothing resolves under it. It’s here because .scam is on ICANN’s Reveal Day list of applied-for strings. Every entry on this page links to its source.
- XYZ · first recordedICANN
- Band chosen: 10-29 (vanity/joke/narrow). The string is a pejorative noun, and the natural reading of any name on it ("acme.scam") is an accusation against the left-hand label. That rules out primary-identity use for almost every commercial, civic, or personal project over the next 5 years; the people who could plausibly use it as a real identity are scam-warning publishers, consumer-protection or fraud-reporting services, and satire sites, and even they tend to prefer neutral strings so that their own name does not read as the thing they warn about. By analogy (flagged as analogy), the closest precedent is .sucks: a negative-word TLD whose activity in the market was dominated by defensive and blocking registrations and by controversy rather than by sites people built and promoted, with thin aftermarket interest. Other novelty strings such as .wtf and .fail (analogy) show that a negative or jokey word can sustain some registrations but rarely a serious primary identity. Not in the band above (30-49): there is no volume-on-price demand I can point to beyond defensive blocks, and defensive registrations produce no brand signal and no resale value for the registrant. Not in the band below (1-9): a narrow real market does exist in anti-scam and consumer-watchdog use, parody, and defensive holdings, so the market is not zero. The applicant on the record is XYZ.COM LLC, with a confirmed standard application; stated neutrally, this operator's portfolio distribution could bring the string to broad retail shelves, which affects registration volume but not whether anyone adopts it as a primary identity. Main market uncertainty: whether any recognisable anti-fraud or consumer-protection organisation adopts a .scam name as its primary identity, which would give the string a legitimate use case beyond blocking and jokes.