.skills
Is .skills a real TLD? Who’s applying to run it?
Nobody has applied for .skills in its own right, as of 7 October 2026. GoDaddy Registry named .skills as the backup string of its .class application.
Who is applying, and what they run today
Two of the 2 are tied to a registry that runs TLDs today. GoDaddy Registry filed 77 applications across the round.
Will names sell?
A readable web address for learning platforms and AI tool makers, but most serious projects would treat it as a side name, not their main one.
Last round the AI scored the 2012 strings blind to their fate. Strings it scored 60 or more hold a median 27,168 names today; those under 30, a median of 30. .skills’s closest 2012 strings hold .courses 16K, .training 23K and .expert 29K.
The nearest 2012 strings, and how many names each holds today
The closest 2012 string, .courses, held 16,445 names, June 2026. .training held 23,492; .expert held 28,534. Chosen by AI from every string in the 2012 round, without being told what happened to any of them.
Same bet: an unowned plural generic noun in the learning economy whose second level is filled by the subject or provider (python.courses / python.skills), sold to training platforms, marketplaces and instructors rather than to any incumbent brand.
Same category, same buyer, same precondition — a generic capability-development noun that only pays off if independent trainers and corporate L&D teams put their primary identity on it instead of .com.
Also monetizes human competence as an identity claim rather than a product or a company, but it is a singular self-designation for one consultant where .skills is a plural catalog word better suited to directories and marketplaces.
edtech and workforce-training platforms, creator-economy course sellers, and AI companies naming agent-skill marketplaces or per-skill microsites (e.g. design.skills-style addresses); secondary interest from HR-tech and certification services.
What a .skills domain is
.skills is not a TLD yet. It is a string on our record of the ICANN 2026 new gTLD round, in our AI & tech category. Nobody has applied for .skills in its own right. It is named on ICANN’s list as part of an application for another string.
Is the .skills domain extension real yet?
.skills 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 .skills domain?
You can’t yet. A .skills 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 .skills was .courses, delegated on 25 February 2015.
Is .skills a real TLD?
Not yet. .skills is not in the DNS root, so nothing resolves under it. It’s here because ICANN’s list names .skills as part of an application for another string. Every entry on this page links to its source.
“NA2631T-T90832 · Registry Services, LLC · replacement string of .class”ICANN
“Cyril Frémont, CEO at web.best and .Best, has publicly revealed 10 proposed top-level domain applications for ICANN's 2026 new gTLD round.”DNForum
- Band chosen: 30-49, usable but limited. The string is a common, plural English keyword with clear semantic fit for education, workforce development, and the emerging AI-agent-skills vocabulary, and the announced positioning (AI cluster, design.skills example) plays to a real naming pattern of subject.skills addresses. It is not in the 50-69 band because keyword TLDs of this shape have, by analogy, rarely produced sustained primary-identity adoption: registrations tend to be defensive, promotional, or price-driven, and an education or AI company choosing a .skills address as its primary brand would still need to explain the choice; there is no verified demand evidence for this string. It is not in the 10-29 band because the word is broadly useful rather than a joke or event-driven vanity string: it supports meaningful left-of-dot combinations across many verticals, which by analogy with other readable-keyword TLDs supports steady volume registrations and some genuine end use. Applicant facts, stated neutrally: the applicant operates .best (IANA-delegated 2014, stated live since 2018) with CentralNic as technical backend, which suggests the namespace would be run on established infrastructure; this informs adoption plumbing, not demand. Main market uncertainty: whether the AI-agent 'skills' naming convention hardens into a durable namespace need over the next 5 years or fades as a vocabulary fad, leaving the TLD to compete as a generic edtech keyword against entrenched .com/.ai habits.