DENIC Publishes Domain Statistics 2002 - Domain Holders Come from 118 Countries

The 6 million .de domains are still distributed very irregularly across the country. This is the result of a geographic analysis of the domain data by the German registry DENIC. There are noticeable differences between the old and the new German states. In the East the domain numbers reach only half the national average, which itself is up 17 percent from 2001, so that statistically 70 of 1000 residents now have a domain name. The usage of domains has shifted strongly towards private use since the middle of the 90s. Only about one fifth of domain names are registered to companies.

While the new German states still produce high growth rates of 20 percent and more, these numbers start from a significantly lower base compared to the West. For example in all of Thuringia the domain number is about equal to that of Frankfurt am Main, whereas in Saxony-Anhalt the number hardly exceeds that of Stuttgart. The highest growth rate in 2002 had Schleswig-Holstein with more than 23 percent. On the county level the development was very irregular as well. While some regions could almost double the numbers from the previous year, like Ludwigshafen and Northern Frisia, others lost nearly a third.

.de-domains are used by domain holders from 118 countries in all. The number of domains for foreign users is only a small fraction of the total with about 30,000 registrations. Most foreign domain holders originate from the neighboring countries Netherlands, Austria and Switzerland with a little more than 6,000 registrations each.

All numbers are from DENIC's domain database as of 31 December 2002. As in the previous years the preparation of the data has been carried out in cooperation with Diplom-Kaufmann Mark Krymalowski and the Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeographisches Institut of Cologne University. Information about all counties and cities are available. In addition to absolute numbers there is also data about the number of domains in relation to the number of residents.

The ranking of the ten cities with the most .de-domains is again led by Berlin with a little more than 320,000 domains. Hamburg was able to pass Munich and is now positioned on second place. Behind those cities very little changed, only Nuremberg (now #9) and Bonn (down one to #10) traded places.

The most domains in relation to the number of residents are still in the Bavarian capital of Munich and surroundings. 1,000 Munich residents own about 180 domains, in the outskirts the number is 161. Bonn (166) and Düsseldorf (156) reach similar numbers per 1,000 residents. Within the German states the city states naturally lead the ranking. Front-runner Hamburg has 131 domains per 1,000 residents followed by Berlin with 95. Hesse is third and with a value of 85 the best territorial state.

The complete analysis is available for download as an Excel Spreadsheet, in addition we have higher-resolution versions of the absolute and relative distribution of domains in Germany in JPEG format.