Curious about the most expensive domain sales that have ever been recorded? At Openprovider, we have gathered the most expensive ones into a top 15 that might surprise you.
(As many buyers and sellers do not publicly disclose domain sales, this list only contains sales that were made public. Be aware that there might be big sales out there that did not make the list!)
15. Fb.com – $8.5 million
Back in 2011, Facebook quietly bought the domain fb.com from the American Farm Bureau Federation. The price? A cool $8.5 million – revealed later by the federation as the payout for “a couple of domain names.” That’s over 42 times what Facebook originally paid for facebook.com! As Mark Zuckerberg joked: “They agreed to give us fb.com, and in return, Facebook has agreed not to go into the farm subsidies business.” A fair trade—no tractors in your News Feed (yet).
14. Porno.com – $8.8 million
Around 4% of content on the Internet is estimated to be porn – a fact that the domain industry is also aware of. Multiple of the highest-selling domain names on this list are connected to porn. Take .porno.com, that sold in 2015 for no less than $8,888,888. Reportedly, domain investor Rick Schwartz paid “just” $42.000 to register this domain back in 1992. Don’t we all wish we had had the foresight to grab those short .coms 30 years ago?
13. Shoes.com – $9 million
With millions of e-commerce sites online these days, you can expect to find some high-value domains there. Shoes.com is an interesting case – it has switched owners four times in ten years. The sale that landed it a spot on this list happened in 2017, when Walmart acquired the name for an eye-popping $9 million. Since then, it’s been sold twice more and now redirects to the website of American footwear retailer DSW.
12. Porn.com – $9.5 million
Sex sells – we’ve seen that with Porno.com, and we are seeing it here again. Porn.com sold for $9.5 million in 2007, making it the second-highest domain transaction ever at the time. While we know porno.com brought in millions in profit for its original buyer, the financial details around porn.com remain a bit more mysterious. What we do know is this: with a name like that and the traffic it likely generated, the original owner probably wasn’t struggling to pay the internet bill.
11. Hotels.com – $11 million
Hotels.com stands out in this list for being one of the earliest recorded six-figure domain sales. The name was purchased for around $11 million in 2001. According to the company CEO, David Roche, this was thought to be “a crazy sum of money” at the time. However, it almost looks like a bargain compared to some of the prices that are charged nowadays.
9 & 10. Sex.com – $14 & $13 million
While this domain may be one of the the “cheapest” ones on this list, it is actually unique, because it was sold twice for record-breaking prices. It was first sold in 2005 for $14 million. In 2010, it switched owners again for a sum no less than $13 million. These transactions put this domain in both the ninth and tenth spot on this list. As can be expected from the name, this coveted domain is currently housing an adult website.
8. Fund.com – £9.99 million
Fund.com was sold for $9.99 million in 2009. Its new owner never launched the website that they were planning to create, and it sold again for a much smaller amount in 2014. Fund.com’s new owner is using the domain for a website that compares insurance companies. This is a common thread in this top 15 of the most expensive domains. No less than 4 out of 15 domains in this list are related to the insurance industry!
7. Insure.com – $16 million
Insure.com is one of the other insurance-related domains on this list. It sold for $16 million back in 2005, and it remains a popular website for American consumers to compare insurance companies across different areas.
6. 360.com – $17 million
This short and sweet domain name sold in 2015 for a whopping $17 million. Previously owned by Vodafone, it passed into the hands of Chinese entrepreneur Zhou Hongyi, CEO of internet security company Qihoo 360. Apparently, Zhou is often referred to as a “domain gangster” in Chinese media for his frequent involvement in record-breaking domain sales and auctions. That’s certainly a fitting nickname! This domain is also unique in this list, as it is the only one not primarily serving an American audience.
5. Internet.com – $18 million
Internet.com sold in 1995 for a record-breaking sum of $18 million. Currently, this domain leads to a somewhat mysterious landing page, which states that they are creating “tomorrow’s home of the Internet 3.0”. As a part of this Web3-related service, users will be able to register their own third-level domains (yourname.internet.com) in the future. Even if there is not much to find on this page, a visitor counter still keeps track of the amount of daily visitors – which usually rack up over 100,000 per day.
4. Voice.com – $30 million
This short and catchy domain sold in 2019 for a record-breaking amount of $30 million. Voice.com used to be owned by an American company called MicroStrategy, which possesses a degree of fame for the collection of premium domain names it has amassed. Although Voice.com is off the market now, contenders like Wisdom.com, Emma.com, and Hope.com are still available. That is, as long as you are willing to pay a lot! Voice.com is currently in the hands of blockchain-based social media platform Block.one. The domain currently serves as a marketplace for NFTs.
3. VacationRentals.com – $35 million
Although premium domains are usually short and sweet, the top three of this list is actually composed of names that are on the longer side of things. VacationRentals.com sold for $35 million in 2007. The CEO of HomeAway, the acquiring party, has stated his “only reason” for buying this domain name as making sure “that Expedia couldn’t have it”. Although VacationRentals.com has since changed its business name to Vrbo, the old domain remains active and running. Vacation rentals appear to be booming in the premium domain landscape in general, as another vacation rental company paid over $ 500,000 in 2018 to acquire vacation.rentals, even with a much less coveted domain extension.
2. Insurance.com – $35.6 million
Insurance.com sold for $35.6 million in 2020, which makes it the second most expensive domain transaction on this list. Its new owner, marketing company QuinStreet, is responsible for multiple record-breaking transactions in this list, including Insure.com, Internet.com, and the number one domain name on this list. The company describes itself as a “pioneer in powering decentralized marketplace spaces” – and they have just the right domain names to do so.
1. CarInsurance.com – $49.7 million
Finally, at the top of this list of most expensive domains we have CarInsurance.com. This domain sold for a whopping $49.7 million in 2019. As you may expect, this domain indeed houses a website about car insurance. Would we have paid $49.7 million for it (if we had access to unlimited funds, that is)? Not sure, but with over 300,000 visitors a month, it may arguably be worth the money to some.
