Company hopes to siphon off domains headed to Squarespace.
WordPress.com is offering to foot the bill for up to 1 million domain transfers.
In June, Google announced it was selling its domains business to Squarespace for $180 million. WordPress.com wants to capture part of those domains, in part because it doesn’t like the idea of a rival and proprietary web builder getting more market share.
So it’s offering to foot the bill for up to 1 million domains to transfer from Google Domains to WordPress.com’s registrar ahead of the transition. (Google Domains has about 10 million domains under management.)
Domain transfers include a year of renewal.
Depending on which extensions people transfer, this could mean $10 million or more in free transfers.
WordPress.com also says its prices will be the same or lower than Google Domains. WordPress said it will only increase prices if the wholesale prices go up. Squarespace has agreed to match Google Domains’ prices for one year, but its prices are normally much higher.
On Twitter, WordPress creator Matt Mullenweg complained that his company wasn’t offered a chance to acquire Google Domains.
Let the website hosting battle begin!
I just need the domain registration, I host my own domains.
You don’t need to use WordPress hosting to take advantage of this offer.
This one was nice
It’s strange that such a key part of the internet is controlled mostly by charlatans.
Will they transfer a premium domain with a high renewal fee for free too?
I’m not sure about Premiums. I’d like to hear from anyone who tries it.