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Global Domains & Strategy (GDS) Metrics

GDS aims to maintain a culture of excellence in its operations. This web page provides information about generic top-level domain (gTLD) marketplace health, survey results, performance metrics for several operations, and a summary analysis report on Registry Service Evaluation Policy (RSEP) process requests.

Domain Name Marketplace Indicators

The Domain Name Marketplace Indicators (registration required) initiative presents statistics pertaining to the marketplace for generic top-level domains (gTLDs) and country code top-level domains (ccTLDs). These indicators are made available through the ICANN Open Data Platform, which the ICANN organization intends to update annually.

ICANN org collaborated with a community Advisory Panel on this effort. The indicator schema and taxonomy document [PDF, 2.0 MB] outlines indicator categories, dimensions/factors, and includes calculation methodology and a glossary of terminology for all featured metrics.

Concurrent to the release of these marketplace indicators, ICANN org will continue to work with the community and the Advisory Panel to evaluate additional enhancements that might be incorporated as part of this initiative.

2021 Contracted Parties Survey Results

ICANN org conducted the fifth annual survey of ICANN contracted parties from 1 November to 23 November 2021. The goal of the survey is to determine how the Global Domains and Strategy (GDS) function interacts with contracted parties, and what steps GDS can take to work more effectively with contracted parties.

This year, ICANN org once again partnered with eBallot to conduct the survey. ICANN org always appreciates hearing from our stakeholders and thanks those who responded to the survey. Please know that GDS encourages contracted parties to provide input at any time by contacting [email protected].

Contracted parties survey results are published below, including a slide presentation with the survey questions and answers.

ICANN 2021 Contracted Parties Survey [PDF, 1.7 MB]
ICANN 2021 Contracted Parties Survey Summary [PDF, 25 KB]

2020 Contracted Parties Survey Results

ICANN 2020 Contracted Parties Satisfaction Survey [PDF, 2.30 MB]
ICANN 2020 Contracted Parties Satisfaction Survey Summary [PDF, 46 KB]

2019 Contracted Parties Survey Results

ICANN 2019 Contracted Parties Satisfaction Survey [PDF, 599 KB]
ICANN 2019 Contracted Parties Satisfaction Survey Summary [PDF, 149 KB]

2018 Contracted Parties Survey Results

ICANN 2018 Contracted Parties Survey [PDF, 4.41 MB]
ICANN Contracted Parties Survey Memo [PDF, 604 KB]

2017 Contracted Parties Survey Results

ICANN 2017 Contracted Parties Survey [PDF, 1 MB]
ICANN Contracted Parties Survey Memo [PDF, 479 KB]
GDD Action Plan to 2017 Contracted Party Survey [PDF, 300 KB]

Operational Metrics

Performance Metrics

The performance metrics below are calculated on a rolling 12-month basis. The information will be updated monthly and published by the end of the following month.

Summary Analysis Reports

Summary analysis reports are generated each calendar year. The information will be updated annually and published by the end of the first calendar quarter.

Domain Name System
Internationalized Domain Name ,IDN,"IDNs are domain names that include characters used in the local representation of languages that are not written with the twenty-six letters of the basic Latin alphabet ""a-z"". An IDN can contain Latin letters with diacritical marks, as required by many European languages, or may consist of characters from non-Latin scripts such as Arabic or Chinese. Many languages also use other types of digits than the European ""0-9"". The basic Latin alphabet together with the European-Arabic digits are, for the purpose of domain names, termed ""ASCII characters"" (ASCII = American Standard Code for Information Interchange). These are also included in the broader range of ""Unicode characters"" that provides the basis for IDNs. The ""hostname rule"" requires that all domain names of the type under consideration here are stored in the DNS using only the ASCII characters listed above, with the one further addition of the hyphen ""-"". The Unicode form of an IDN therefore requires special encoding before it is entered into the DNS. The following terminology is used when distinguishing between these forms: A domain name consists of a series of ""labels"" (separated by ""dots""). The ASCII form of an IDN label is termed an ""A-label"". All operations defined in the DNS protocol use A-labels exclusively. The Unicode form, which a user expects to be displayed, is termed a ""U-label"". The difference may be illustrated with the Hindi word for ""test"" — परीका — appearing here as a U-label would (in the Devanagari script). A special form of ""ASCII compatible encoding"" (abbreviated ACE) is applied to this to produce the corresponding A-label: xn--11b5bs1di. A domain name that only includes ASCII letters, digits, and hyphens is termed an ""LDH label"". Although the definitions of A-labels and LDH-labels overlap, a name consisting exclusively of LDH labels, such as""icann.org"" is not an IDN."