Namecheap – Registrar review

Namecheap is one of the most popular registrar both in terms of the number of registered domains and reputation. As can be concluded from the brand name, pricing of domains is very friendly at Namecheap. Namecheap also provides free Whois Guard for one year to each registered domains. These privacy subscriptions can be used for any names, so can be used to extend Whois Guard of earlier registered domain names.

Namecheap index page

The design of Namecheap is somewhat outdated (except some redesigned content pages) but it is logically structured. When logged in, an index page appears summarizing the most important facts and to-dos with links to the corresponding pages.

The most important page is the main dashboard of your domains.

Domains’ dashboard at Namecheap

The page is straightforward and the most important properties are visible right away and they can be easily edited by clicking on the given domain.

I have some problems transferring out domains from Namecheap recently. They send an authorization code to the Registrar’s email address almost immediately after request. However, these codes are often wrong. And when I say often, I mean really often, almost half of the codes that I got in the last half year was wrong. This is really annoying, since I have to contact the customer support all the time. The good side is that I can test the customer support and they will solve the issue effectively, in a day or so. They say that it is not their fault but their authorization code provider, which is surely true, still should be better handled.

I especially like the free DNS services of Namecheap. Not all Registrar offers DNS services, when this is the case, you can simply use Namecheap nameservers there and set the domain records at Namecheap. While this is really a useful feature, Cloudflare is so great in this field that it is hard to challenge with their services.

It is really clear that Namecheap positions itself as a “better Godaddy”, which is sometimes true, sometimes not. Namecheap has very similar products as can be found at Godaddy but some of them are missing or worse. E.g. Namecheap Marketplace, which contains millions of domains for sale is an almost unsearchable one and without an rss or any export functionality, there is no chance to find good domains on the list. It is clear that the marketplace and domain buyers and sellers are not the focus of Namecheap.

To summarize, Namecheap is a popular registrar, which is perfectly suited for beginners. They have an easy to use interface to setup domains, provide free addons and have an effective customer support.