In this article we discuss everything about the .gle domain name.
Initially, it was introduced by the Google Registry and we mentioned this back in July 2013 when hundreds of new gTLDs were exploding onto the scene. However, introduced, does come with a caveat. The gTLD is private (closed for outside registration). This means that only Google can register domain names with .gle extension.
Who owns .gle?
Just looking at the three letters, it’s hard not to think of Goo-gle. So if you’ve guessed that Google (Alphabet) is behind this TLD, you were right. Google’s registrar division is behind .gle. According to IANA it was delegated 09.09.2014.
Google owns a lot of domain names, but as we can see, they also own a lot of Top Level Domains. Quick reminder, there are ccTLDs like .ca for Canada, .br for Brazil and .se for Sweden. There are also gTLDs like .com and .net, but also new ones like .poker, .hotel, .men and…
Similar to .gle, Google also owns .goog, .google, .guge, and .goo.
Also similar to .gle, but has absolutely nothing with Google is .gl (ccTLD for Greenland). However, having said that, Google owns a URL shortening service goo.gl and offers Greenlanders to use Google at google.gl.
For those of you who are paying attention, there’s a catch. If you are looking carefully at Google’s announcement above, you might spot .blog. Well, the way it worked, you could have announced anything. Afterward, if another company showed interest (which Donuts, Auttomatic, and a few others did) the gTLD would go into auction. In .blog case, for around $20 million, it went to Auttomatic (WordPress blogging platform).
With that being said, let’s get back to .gle. Unlike .blog which would love to have as many registrants as possible, .gle is reserved for Google (Alphabet).
Who can register .gle domain?
Returning to my intro, .gle is closed, and only Alphabet is holding (registering) domain names. This means you can’t go to GoDaddy or any other big domain registrar and register yourname.gle.
.gle is what you would call a branded TLD. Big companies that could splurge millions of dollars on domain names, reserved their TLD (in Google’s case, they reserved several). BMW (with .bmw), Apple (with .apple), Amazon (with .amazon), and Man (with .man) to name a few.
Does our API support .gle domain?
Yes, the few domain names that are registered with .gle, you can check with both our Whois API and Domain Availability API. .gle domain is one among hundreds of other TLDs we support.
It works like any other domain name, and the Whois record also looks the same. Below is an example of Google whois .gle domain, goo.gle.
Google Registry – Google Domains what’s the difference?
Everything I have written so far about the .gle domain name comes from Google Registry. This is a separate entity from Google Domains (that was recently sold to Squarespace and that “sold” google.com for $10. ) Google Registry is a registry (you can think of them responsible for creating the domains) and Google Domains is a registrar (you can think of them responsible for selling the domains).
If you’ve heard of Verisign (not to be mistaken with Verizon), well, Google Registry is responsible for Google’s domains like Verisign is responsible for .com and .net. And then Google Domains is similar to GoDaddy and other domain registrars.
forms.gle – popular use of .gle domain
Google is using .gle domain as a shortner for it’s services. Forms.gle in particular. We can see that the forms.gle is a registered domain name, and it is registered with the only registrar / registry with which it can be registered – nic.google
Does that mean that forms.gle is safe? Yes, forms.gle as a service is safe and it belongs to Google, however, that doesn’t mean that someone can’t pull off a scam using Google’s forms services.
- Nameservers are set to:
ns1.googledomains.com - ns2.googledomains.com
- ns3.googledomains.com
- ns4.googledomains.com
Domain name was registered on : 2019-02-12
Domain name expires on : 2024-02-12
Other popular .gle domains
- ads.gle
- expeditions.gle
- fdl.gle
- goo.gle
- posts.gle
- pay.gle
- pairdevice.gle
- ok.gle
- nic.gle
- hey.gle
