About .co.za Domains

About .co.za Domains

.co.za is the country code top-level domain (ccTLD) representing South Africa. It is administered by UniForum SA, which trades under the name Registry.net.za.

Who Can Register .co.za Domains

  • Anyone can register a .co.za domain name. There are no eligibility restrictions.
  • Individuals, businesses, organizations, and entities from South Africa or abroad may all register .co.za domains.

Registration Requirements and Restrictions

  • Domain names must be 1 to 63 characters in length
  • Allowed characters are:
    • Letters (a-z)
    • Numbers (0-9)
    • Hyphens
  • Hyphens cannot be used as the first or last character
  • Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) containing Unicode characters are supported

Registration and Renewal Period

  • Initial registration is for 1 year
  • Subsequent renewals are for 1 year
  • Expiring domains enter a 30 day grace period, after which they may be deleted
  • Domains can be set to auto-renew to avoid expiration

Managing and Transferring Domains

  • Registrar transfers are allowed after 60 days from initial registration
  • An auth code may be required for transfers from certain registrars like Hexonet
  • Transfer requests trigger an email vote requiring approval to process
  • Transfers not approved within 5 days will be cancelled

Nameserver Requirements

  • Between 0 and 5 nameservers can be configured
  • Nameservers must be authoritative
  • IPv4 and IPv6 addresses are allowed
  • DNSSEC is not currently supported

Making Updates to Domains

  • Updates like nameserver or contact changes can take up to 7 days to fully propagate
  • Domains are locked while updates are processing

Cancelling and Redeeming Domains

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