Uptake of .eu use for the trade and IT sectors

For several years now, we have run two yearly categorisation exercises regarding the use of .eu.

Throughout April, we deployed the first exercise of 2021 to understand possible new patterns within how people and businesses are using the .eu top-level domain. From a random sample of 100,000 domain names, we found that more than 80% of domains have active web services, and 15% are DNSSEC signed. Out of those names, more than 44% resolve into a structured website.

We classified the websites according to the categories as defined by NACE, the statistical classification of economic activities in the European Community, and agreed by the members of CENTR.

In comparison to the categorisation of December 2020, the findings show a clear increase in the ‘Trade’ (+1.67%), ‘IT’ (+3.19%) and ‘Community’ (+3.62%) categories. The uptake in the first two categories is a sign of the market shift towards more online sales and services.