How to Choose a Domain Name: .in, .com or .co.in?

Your domain name is your business's address on the internet. It is on your visiting card, your WhatsApp profile, your invoices and your signboard. Changing it later is possible but painful, so it is worth getting right the first time.

What a domain name is

A domain name is the part after www. — for example onpad.in. It has two parts:

• The name — onpad
• The extension (top-level domain) — .in

You rent a domain by the year from a registrar, and renew it before it expires.

.in, .com or .co.in?

For a business serving Indian customers, .in is a strong choice. Google understands it as an Indian site, which can help local search, and customers increasingly recognise it.

If you can, register both .in and .com for your name and point one to the other. It protects your brand and catches visitors who type the wrong one.

What makes a good domain name

1. Short. Easy to type on a phone and fit on a card.
2. Easy to say and spell. Imagine telling it to someone over a phone call. If you have to spell it out, it is too complicated.
3. Your brand name. sunrisebakery.in is better than best-cakes-in-thane.in. Your brand lasts; keyword names look spammy and limit you if you expand.
4. No hyphens or numbers if you can avoid them. People forget whether there was a hyphen, or whether "4" was written as "four".
5. Not confusing with a competitor or an existing trademark.

Mistakes to avoid

• Letting the developer register it in their name. The domain must be registered in your business's name, with your email address. This is the most common and most painful mistake.
• Forgetting to renew. Turn on auto-renewal and keep the registrar's email address up to date. Expired domains can be bought by others.
• Using a free email address for the registration that nobody checks. Renewal and security notices go there.
• Very long names. Every extra word is a chance for a typo.
• Trademark problems. Search the name before you build a brand around it.

How to register a domain

1. Choose a reputable registrar or ask your web company to help — but make sure the account is in your name.
2. Search for your preferred name and check the extensions available.
3. Register for at least a year; longer registration saves you from forgetting renewals.
4. Enable auto-renew and registrar lock (it prevents unauthorised transfers).
5. Save the login details somewhere safe, and give your developer access only when needed.

Domain, hosting and email are three different things

People often mix these up:

• Domain — your address (yourbusiness.in).
• Hosting — the server where your website files live.
• Business email — mailboxes like name@yourbusiness.in.

You can buy them from one company or from different ones. What matters is that each account belongs to you.

What it costs

A domain is the cheapest part of your website: usually a few hundred to around fifteen hundred rupees a year, depending on the extension and registrar. Premium names that someone else already owns can cost much more. For the full budget picture, see website cost in India.

Already have a domain?

Check three things today:

1. Is it registered in your business's name?
2. Do you have the registrar login?
3. Is auto-renew on, and when does it expire?

If the answer to any of these is no, fix it before anything else.

Need help?

ONPAD sets up domains, hosting and business email in your name as part of our website services. If you are planning a new website, read how to choose a website design company in Mumbai or ask us for a quote.

Written by the ONPAD TeamWe build ONPAD, WhatsApp marketing software on the official WhatsApp Business API, from Mumbai.