Forum

[Happiness]

I read that Hostgator is planning to have domain registration ability soon.

When that happens is it better to register the domain with them [assuming the price is ok] or is it better to stay with Name Cheap or Go Daddy.

 

[Ampie G]

Hi! It doesn't really matter if you're using different companies for your hosting and domain. You just need to make sure you point the domain nameservers to your hosting.

 

[jmpruitt]

actually Hostgator already has domain registration, but they are more expensive. also, having your domain registered on a third party makes it easier to change if you ever do change webhosts (although I am happy with hostgator myself). Sometimes when webhosts have the domain registered,they dont want to let go of your business and let you transfer to someone else.

Personally, I have all my domains registered through namecheap and hosted with hostgator.

 

[mikeantiga]

Most of the time hosting companies charge higher for domain registration so it's better if you have the domains registered on a third party registrar like NameCheap or Affilorama (http://www.affilorama.com/domains) that provide cheaper registration and renewal fees. But one minor disadvantage of having another company handle your registration is that you'll have to deal with two different companies when renewing your accounts, e.g. Hostgator for hosting and Namecheap for domain registration.

 

[faradina]

In most cases, my main criteria for choosing domain registrars is the price. The reputation of the company comes next, and the services bundled with the domain comes in third, and the options for renewal is fourth.

Even if the price is right, if the company seems to be shoddy and/or shady, I go for the higher-priced registration.

If they throw in free private registration, that's a definite plus point; more so if there's a free email account, etc., etc.

And, of course, I do not like to be tied in. If the lower price and extras mean that I must stay with them for a set period of time, you can be sure that I am not going to register my domain with them.

 

[Happiness]

Thanks all

 

[mikeantiga]

There are some hosting companies that offer "free domains for life" which basically means that they will pay your domain registration fee so long as you keep a hosting account with them. But there's no way a web host/registrar can prevent you from transferring the registration to another provider. You can transfer a domain name anytime for as long as it is not within the first 60 days of the initial registration/transfer and the domain registration is not expiring within 5-10 days.

 

[michael025]

My own personal preference in choosing domain registrars is to go directly to the source, network solutions(netsol.com) since all the other name providers actually register the domains through them anyway, but although they do have hosting, I prefer having it hosted elsewhere. Anyway mikeantiga's suggestion is very logical. It might be a pain to actually have to renew your name registration and hosting separately : )

 

[jimweb43]

I agree Mike, I personally use either Godaddy or namecheap. I like Namecheap because they offer 1 year free of who is guard upon registering a domain through them.

 

[danchan]

Name cheap is a better option simply because you won't get messages from GoDaddy reminding you of how you can combine their registration services with hosting as well.