COUNTRY CODE DOMAIN NAMES (ccTLD)

While generic domains were addressed to a very wide audience, all the Internet Community, geographic domains were less ambicious in their scope, as they were only intended for those territories selected to have country domans, so that these territories would use their domains in the most suitable way.

Such liberal birth has provoked a great variety in the names of territorial domains. There are some domains which do not have quite a geographical approach (or none at all), as not even the Register is located in the territory of the domain, and others which, although they have been granted and are active, have only a few hundreds of domains registered at their database, as they are strictly restricted.

Country or geographic domains were previewed by Jon Postel in his legendary document RFC 1591 of March 1994, as domains completely managed by national authorities, to which all the competences were delegated and whose sole limitation in their performance was to maintain a public service in the name of the Internet Community.

The IANA took as a basis the ISO 3166-1 standards of the ISO Agency of the UN in order to determine which domain would belong to each country. The ISO 3166-1 standard sets a two-letter code for every country and for several geographic entities. Therefore, in order for a territory to have its own domain, first it had to be included in this ISO 3166-1 list.

Currently, the following extensions exist:

.ac - Ascension Island .ad - Andorra .ae - United Arab Emirates .af - Afghanistan .ag - Antigua and Barbuda .ai - Anguilla .al - Albania .am - Armenia .an - Netherlands Antilles .ao - Angola .aq - Antarctica .ar - Argentina .as - American Samoa .at - Austria .au - Australia .aw - Aruba .az - Azerbaijan .ax - Aland Islands .ba - Bosnia and Herzegovina .bb - Barbados .bd - Bangladesh .be - Belgium .bf - Burkina Faso .bg - Bulgaria .bh - Bahrain .bi - Burundi .bj - Benin .bm - Bermuda .bn - Brunei Darussalam .bo - Bolivia .br - Brazil .bs - Bahamas .bt - Bhutan .bv - Bouvet Island .bw - Botswana .by - Belarus .bz - Belize .ca - Canada .cc - Cocos (Keeling) Islands .cd - Congo, The Democratic Republic of the .cf - Central African Republic .cg - Congo, Republic of .ch - Switzerland .ci - Cote d'Ivoire .ck - Cook Islands .cl - Chile .cm - Cameroon .cn - China .co - Colombia .cr - Costa Rica .cs - Serbia and Montenegro .cu - Cuba .cv - Cape Verde .cx - Christmas Island .cy - Cyprus .cz - Czech Republic .de - Germany .dj - Djibouti .dk - Denmark .dm - Dominica .do - Dominican Republic .dz - Algeria .ec - Ecuador .ee - Estonia .eg - Egypt .eh - Western Sahara .er - Eritrea .es - Spain .et - Ethiopia .fi - Finland .fj - Fiji .fk - Falkland Islands (Malvinas) .fm - Micronesia, Federal State of .fo - Faroe Islands .fr - France .ga - Gabon .gb - United Kingdom .gd - Grenada .ge - Georgia .gf - French Guiana .gg - Guernsey .gh - Ghana .gi - Gibraltar .gl - Greenland .gm - Gambia .gn - Guinea .gp - Guadeloupe .gq - Equatorial Guinea .gr - Greece .gs - South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands .gt - Guatemala .gu - Guam .gw - Guinea-Bissau .gy - Guyana .hk - Hong Kong .hm - Heard and McDonald Islands .hn - Honduras .hr - Croatia/Hrvatska .ht - Haiti .hu - Hungary .id - Indonesia .ie - Ireland .il - Israel .im - Isle of Man .in - India .io - British Indian Ocean Territory .iq - Iraq .ir - Iran, Islamic Republic of .is - Iceland .it - Italy .je - Jersey .jm - Jamaica .jo - Jordan .jp - Japan .ke - Kenya .kg - Kyrgyzstan .kh - Cambodia .ki - Kiribati .km - Comoros .kn - Saint Kitts and Nevis .kp - Korea, Democratic People's Republic .kr - Korea, Republic of .kw - Kuwait .ky - Cayman Islands

.kz - Kazakhstan .la - Lao People's Democratic Republic .lb - Lebanon .lc - Saint Lucia .li - Liechtenstein .lk - Sri Lanka .lr - Liberia .ls - Lesotho .lt - Lithuania .lu - Luxembourg .lv - Latvia .ly - Libyan Arab Jamahiriya .ma - Morocco .mc - Monaco .md - Moldova, Republic of .mg - Madagascar .mh - Marshall Islands .mk - Macedonia, The Former Yugoslav Republic of .ml - Mali .mm - Myanmar .mn - Mongolia .mo - Macau .mp - Northern Mariana Islands .mq - Martinique .mr - Mauritania .ms - Montserrat .mt - Malta .mu - Mauritius .mv - Maldives .mw - Malawi .mx - Mexico .my - Malaysia .mz - Mozambique .na - Namibia .nc - New Caledonia .ne - Niger .nf - Norfolk Island .ng - Nigeria .ni - Nicaragua .nl - Netherlands .no - Norway .np - Nepal .nr - Nauru .nu - Niue .nz - New Zealand .om - Oman .pa - Panama .pe - Peru .pf - French Polynesia .pg - Papua New Guinea .ph - Philippines .pk - Pakistan .pl - Poland .pm - Saint Pierre and Miquelon .pn - Pitcairn Island .pr - Puerto Rico .ps - Palestinian Territories .pt - Portugal .pw - Palau .py - Paraguay .qa - Qatar .re - Reunion Island .ro - Romania .ru - Russian Federation .rw - Rwanda .sa - Saudi Arabia .sb - Solomon Islands .sc - Seychelles .sd - Sudan .se - Sweden .sg - Singapore .sh - Saint Helena .si - Slovenia .sj - Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands .sk - Slovak Republic .sl - Sierra Leone .sm - San Marino .sn - Senegal .so - Somalia .sr - Suriname .st - Sao Tome and Principe .sv - El Salvador .sy - Syrian Arab Republic .sz - Swaziland .tc - Turks and Caicos Islands .td - Chad .tf - French Southern Territories .tg - Togo .th - Thailand .tj - Tajikistan .tk - Tokelau .tl - Timor-Leste .tm - Turkmenistan .tn - Tunisia .to - Tonga .tp - East Timor .tr - Turkey .tt - Trinidad and Tobago .tv - Tuvalu .tw - Taiwan .tz - Tanzania .ua - Ukraine .ug - Uganda .uk - United Kingdom .um - United States Minor Outlying Islands .us - United States .uy - Uruguay .uz - Uzbekistan .va - Holy See (Vatican City State) .vc - Saint Vincent and the Grenadines .ve - Venezuela .vg - Virgin Islands, British .vi - Virgin Islands, U.S. .vn - Vietnam .vu - Vanuatu .wf - Wallis and Futuna Islands .ws - Western Samoa .ye - Yemen .yt - Mayotte .yu - Yugoslavia .za - South Africa .zm - Zambia .zw - Zimbabwe