GoDaddy’s appraisal tool struggles to keep up, but has uses

The actual values are often poor, but it’s a useful tool for evaluating large pools of domains.

This is part of Domain Name Wire’s review of automated domain appraisal tools. See all reviews: Estibot, GoDaddy, Atom, Appraise.net, GoExpired, Dynadot, NameWorth, Saw, Appraise.software, Humbleworth.

GoDaddy’s domain appraisal system is a favorite punching bag in the domain industry. We get it: many domain buyers trust GoDaddy, and they ask why a domain is selling for more than GoDaddy’s valuation.

Even GoDaddy doesn’t use its own appraisals. It prices many domains in its owned and operated portfolio for more than its appraisal numbers.

While the word is that GoDaddy is working on improvements, it is currently using a very old model with outdated data. The market is moving, and its tool hasn’t kept up with the times.

GoDaddy’s appraisal results are fairly basic: the price and a few justifications (e.g., “Memorable: makematter.com is easy to remember.”) It used to provide sales comps, but no longer does.

Domain Discount Club Pro members get access to an appraiser in Domain Academy that provides multiple pricing levels. Unfortunately, these different levels are worse than the main appraisals. For example, GoDaddy says there’s only an 82.5% chance that Dragonfly.com will sell within a year if it’s priced at only $1,000.

But there’s another Domain Academy tool worth looking at: the bulk valuation tool gives you not just the standard GoDaddy valuation, but data on TLD registrations, matching companies in Crunchbase, matching Github repositories, and a lot more.

Let’s dig in.

Two word brandables

We evaluated two domain names in this category: MakeMatter.com, which sold for $15,000, and PressBridge.com, which sold for $5,000.

Both of these domains are in the sweet spot for two word dictionary brandables of $3,000-$15,000. Yes, some sellers hold out for higher amounts, and their data will show these domains sell for much more. But looking at overall sale data, it’s reasonable for an appraisal system to return anything in this price range for this type of domain.

GoDaddy appraised MakeMatter.com at $2,615 and PressBridge.com at $4,405.

Andrew sold MakeMatter.com through GoDaddy, so it knows the price. But it doesn’t use current data. (Of course, if GoDaddy showed updated appraisals that matched the sale prices, this would disclose what domains sold for. GoDaddy used to show comps that sometimes included the same domain.)

GoDaddy tends to value domains between $2,000 and $5,000. So, if you sell domains in this range, you can expect that the valuations are directionally correct…even though it’s just because the tool is compressed in that range.

While GoDaddy’s values for the two test domains are lower than the sales prices, many domain investors have sold similar domains in this range. Andrew has sold a few domains on GoDaddy that were actually appraised at higher prices than what he sold them for.

As for our junk, unregistered test domain: GoDaddy said CloudToaster.com was worth $1,410.

One word, high value .com

Ever since it launched, GoDaddy has categorized very high value domains as being worth $25,000 or more.

Domain investors have focused on the $25,000 number and called it inaccurate. However, it’s technically correct: names like Dragonfly.com are indeed worth more than $25k. It’s just that it’s a lot more.

GoDaddy recently made a change. Andrew doesn’t want to take full credit for it, but he’s one of the people who has asked GoDaddy to change the verbiage to drop the number. Indeed, GoDaddy now says these domains are “too high to estimate”.

Another issue is that domains that will easily sell for six figures don’t always crack the “too high to estimate” barrier. Take a look at some of the domains on GoDaddy’s premium DomainNames.com marketplace. It’s designed for domains valued over $100,000. Yet the first listing we tried, willow.com, has a $23,566 valuation.

Popular ccTLDs

We ran a solid one word .io, and a plural .ai of lesser quality through GoDaddy’s appraisal tool.

Mike sold expedite.io for $14,995. GoDaddy valued it at only $5,316.

We also valued kickers.ai, which Andrew sold for $8,000. GoDaddy valued it at only $171.

Admittedly, kickers.ai isn’t the best .ai domain out there. But GoDaddy’s $4,321 valuation of money.ai shows that it quite simply can’t appraise .ai domain names.

Exact Match descriptive

Exact match, category defining domains aren’t as popular as they used to be. These days, it’s all about the one word brandable dictionary term.

But there’s no doubt WaterFilters.com has a lot of value. It’s for sale for $3.5 million. We don’t know what it will sell for, but this is a huge business, especially for online sales.

GoDaddy valued the domain at $18,332, the lowest among the valuation services we tested.

Three and four letter domains

Three and four letter domains are some of the most liquid domains on the market.

We tested a pronounceable CVCV .com domain, dujo.com, that is listed on Afternic for $36,000.

Our goal was to see if the algorithms caught that this was not just a random set of letters. Pronounceable, brandable four letter domains are generally worth more than unpronounceable random letters.

GoDaddy valued it at $11,903, toward the lower end of the valuation tools we tested.

We also tested a four letter, non-pronounceable domain. Logan Flatt sold MOTG.com for $14,888. GoDaddy valued it at $7,177.

Directionally, these valuations are correct: dujo.com should be valued higher than motg.com. Even if you don’t agree with the valuations, it’s important that it “ranked” these correctly. More on that later.

For a three letter domain, we tested VJN.com. It’s listed for sale on Afternic for $39,000. V and J aren’t great letters, so this is likely on the lower end of three letter .com values.

GoDaddy valued the domain at $22,670. Given the asking price, this doesn’t seem way off. When an appraisal tool values something at about 2/3rds the asking price, it’s hard to complain that it’s too far off, even if you think the domain is worth more.

New TLDs

New top level domains are very hard to value, but GoDaddy gives it a stab.

We tried a couple of new TLDs.

Andrew sold voicemail.app for $5,000 last year. He bought it in Early Access when the TLD launched. GoDaddy thinks it’s worth $1,071.

The market for .app domains is improving, especially with the advent of vibe coding platforms. NameBio lists a number of recent sales in the $1,000-$5,000 range, along with some much higher ones. The most recent sale as of the time of analysis was hidden.app for $3,995. GoDaddy values it at $2,261.

Mark Levine sold timber.homes for $2,899. GoDaddy values it at $2,600. Hey, even a broken clock is right twice a day.

I imagine that GoDaddy’s outdated algorithm and data make it difficult to value new top level domains.

Final analysis

Earlier, we noted that GoDaddy’s appraisal tool “stack ranked” the two four-letter domains correctly, regardless of what the values were.

We think this is generally true of GoDaddy’s tool. The individual numbers are bad, but it’s useful for making a crude first cut at ordering a list. When Andrew searches for domains in GoDaddy Auctions using ExpiredDomains.net, he defaults to ordering by the GoDaddy valuations. Generally speaking, the better domains are toward the top of the list.

But GoDaddy needs to do better given its place in the industry. It is the largest domain registrar, and many end users try its appraisal tool when negotiating for a domain name. The low prices can undermine GoDaddy’s own interests of selling more aftermarket domains.