You’d think it’d be easy to find the cheapest domain name registrars. Unfortunately, it isn’t. There are simply so many different pricing structures, and a lack of any central comparison website, making a true comparison impossible. In this article, I will look at some common pricing methods, to help you decide which kind of registrar will be best for you.

The first thing you should realise is that most of the companies out there saying they’re domain registrars really aren’t. In order to become a registrar, you have to pay a hefty fee to each one of the registries you want to sell domain names in. Even at high volumes, it takes years to make this fee back. To avoid this high start-up cost, most companies out there just buy domains wholesale from properly registered registrars, and resell them at a small profit. For this reason, the best way to save money is usually to get as close as you can to the original source of the domains. Don’t get stuck in the situation where what you’re buying has been resold three times over – research the company and try to move up the chain.

At the same time, you should notice that the more domains you buy, the cheaper they are. You should use the same registrar each time you register a domain name, and try to register in bulk if you want lots. You will also save a lot of money if you register for more than one year – ten-year domain registrations are actually shockingly good value, for example.

Besides all this, there are all sorts of extras that your registrar can charge you for. It’s up to you to decide how many you want. The various privacy guard services that stop your name and address from being made public are often good value, especially if you think your site might be controversial. Buying hosting at this point, however, is always a bad idea, as the deals you are offered by your registrar will never be as good as the ones you could get from an independent web host.