Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, which means we may earn a small commission if you decide to buy any product or services through our links, at no additional cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.
When you create a website, you confused by the terminologies like domain name, web hosting and website builders. In this guide, we have covered what is a domain name and how does it work.
What is a Domain Name?
A domain name is the address that you type in your browser to access a website. This is the unique identity of any individual, business or organization on the internet. In simple terms, a domain name is human-readable label for a specific IP address.
Let’s take another example to understand it in a better way.
When someone wants to reach at your home, they either call you or ask you your home address. In the case of internet too, website is your home and domain name is the address.
For example: The domain name for this website is webhostinginsights.com and IP address is 69.172.201.153.
IP Address: IP Address is unique address assigned to each device connected to a computer network. It helps to communicate with other devices over an IP-based network like the internet.
A domain name has two elements. For example, the domain name WebHostingInsights.com consists the website’s name (WebHostingInsights) and domain name extension (.com) which is the top level domain (TLD).
Find your domain name below:
What is Top Level Domain (TLD)?
Top level domain (TLD) is the extension of a domain name or the last section of a domain name. In layman’s terms, the section following the domain name after the dot.
It could be .com, .gov, .net, .org, .edu, or .info. This is called as the top-level domain or TLD.
For example, in the domain name WebHostingInsights.com, “.com” is WebHostingInsights’s TLD.
According to wikipedia, all top level domain (TLD) is managed by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which operates the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), and is in charge of maintaining the DNS root zone.
What is a gTLD Domain Name?
gTLDs or generic top-level domains are particularly used to indicate businesses and organisations. It’s the domain extension “.com” or the “.org” following the domain name.
The most commonly used gTLD domain names are as follows:
- .com (commercial)
- .net (network)
- .org (organisation)
- .edu (education)
- .gov (government)
- .co (company)
- .biz (business)
- .info (informational)
