category.naming_services.label

category.naming_services.promise

Starting path

Renewable, or lifetime? Those are two different products

Naming Services evaluated across can you actually lose the name?, onchain registry or company namespace, does your wallet resolve it without a plugin, and published price, stable unit, stated renewal.

category.naming_services.promise Reviewed on how you could lose the name, whether the registry is onchain or a company namespace, whether your wallet resolves it without a plugin, and published renewal terms.

Start with the smart category assistant or jump straight into quick questions. Both paths narrow to the same recommendation standard.

How we review

Recommendation first, comparison only if needed.

Reviewed and rechecked on the current cycle.

Commercial relationships disclosed before clickout.

Audit

Infrastructure

Methodology

2026.04.0

published 2026-04-27

Providers tracked

470+

across 49 categories

Last verified

2026-08-04

editorial freshness

Editorial board

4

audit-log live

Decision guide

What matters most before choosing in this category

The right naming service depends on how you could lose the name, which the two business models in this category answer completely differently. One sells an annually renewed registration that expires if you stop paying; the other sells a 'lifetime, no renewal' domain whose permanence depends on the company continuing to exist and honour it. Both are defensible, and only one matches what most buyers assume they are buying. After that: does your wallet resolve it without a plugin, and can the name be reclaimed on a trademark claim?

Key question

Would you rather renew annually and keep control, or pay once and trust a company to persist?

Key question

Which chain and wallet must resolve this name without the user installing anything?

Key question

Is your next step about using naming services, or do you still need a wallet, exchange, or bridge decision first?

Current editor lead

ENS (Ethereum Name Service)

Onchain .eth registry on Ethereum mainnet; annual renewal required

Data checked Aug 2026

Onchain .eth registry on Ethereum mainnet; annual renewal required. Strongest on does your wallet resolve it without a plugin (10/10): The only name in this set that two competing registries chose to interoperate with rather than replace: base.org/names describes Basenames as built on the ENS protocol working "across EVM chains", and 3dns.box lists "Integrated ENS support" as a headline feature of a real-DNS product. No competitor in this comparison… Weakest on can you actually lose the name? (7/10): You can lose it by forgetting, not by being taken: docs.ens.domains/registry/eth documents a hard annual expiry, a 90-day grace period, then a 21-day Dutch auction opening near $100M USD. Against that, there is no vendor-side revocation clause anywhere in the model — no ToS take-down right, no UDRP, no registrar with… Published price: Annual registration, quoted in USD and paid in ETH: "5+ characters: $5/year, 4 characters: $160/year, 3 characters: $640/year". After expiry: 90-day grace period, then a 21-day "Temporary Premium Auction" — "Dutch auction, meaning that the price starts high…

Best for

Does your wallet resolve it without a plugin — 10/10Onchain registry or company namespace — 9/10Published price, stable unit, stated renewal — 9/10

Main tradeoff

ENS Labs cancelled Namechain — the ZK rollup announced in 2024 specifically to make .eth registration cheap — on 6 February 2026, and moved ENSv2 to Ethereum mainnet only (theblock.co/post/388932). Registration therefore stays a two-transaction L1 operation with L1 gas indefinitely. Separately, the $5/year headline is per-year and the clock does not stop: an .eth name is rented, and a 90-day lapse plus a 21-day auction is all that stands between you and someone else owning your payment address.

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Annual registration, quoted in USD and paid in ETH: "5+ characters: $5/year, 4 characters: $160/year, 3 characters: $640/year". After expiry: 90-day grace period, then a 21-day "Temporary Premium Auction" — "Dutch auction, meaning that the price starts high (~100 Million USD) and exponentially decrease till it hits 0 or a bid goes through". Plus L1 gas on a two-transaction registration.

Weighted criteria

Can you actually lose the name?40%

Onchain registry or company namespace25%

Does your wallet resolve it without a plugin25%

Published price, stable unit, stated renewal10%

Leading options

Shared shortlist for this category

These providers are pulled from the same category comparison catalog used in validation, so the category page, comparison page, and provider reviews stay aligned.

ENS (Ethereum Name Service)

Onchain .eth registry on Ethereum mainnet; annual renewal required

Editor lead

Best for: Does your wallet resolve it without a plugin — 10/10

SNS (Solana Name Service, formerly Bonfida)

Solana .sol registry; single one-time payment, no expiry documented

Solana .sol registry; single one-time payment, no expiry documented. Strongest on can you actually lose the name? (9/10): The strongest ownership model in this set, and the only 'no renewal' claim that survives reading the fine print. The docs state flatly "you will have NO further payments to keep your domain" (docs.sns.id) and — unlike Unstoppable — the terms carry no matching vendor right to suspend or take down the name. There is no… Weakest on does your wallet resolve it without a plugin (5/10): Strictly single-ecosystem. Nothing in this comparison built on or integrated .sol: Base's naming layer chose ENS (base.org/names) and 3DNS integrates ENS (3dns.box), neither mentions SNS. A .sol name is a Solana-native payment address and resolves nowhere on EVM, which is the majority of the addresses most buyers… Published price: "1 character .sol names: $750 USD, 2 character .sol names: $700 USD, 3 character .sol names: $640 USD, 4 character .sol names: $160 USD, 5+ character .sol names: $20 USD" — and, verbatim: "Charges for domain names are once-off, that is, you will have NO…

Best for: Can you actually lose the name? — 9/10

Unstoppable Domains

Company-issued Web3 TLDs sold as one-time mints, plus ICANN DNS registrar

Company-issued Web3 TLDs sold as one-time mints, plus ICANN DNS registrar. Strongest on can you actually lose the name? (4/10): Unstoppable's own Terms of Use contain both halves of the contradiction. The marketing promise: "when you buy and claim a Web3 domain from Unstoppable Domains, you own it forever - no renewal fees!" The same document: "we reserve the right to suspend or terminate any user account, and to take down any domains… Weakest on published price, stable unit, stated renewal (3/10): The product being marketed (lifetime Web3 domains) has no loadable published price: unstoppabledomains.com/pricing, /pricing/at-cost and two support.unstoppabledomains.com pricing-tier articles all returned HTTP 404 on 2026-08-04, and the blog's own 'domain fees' explainer contains no UD prices. The only price you can… Published price: The only loadable static price page is a conventional ICANN registrar table with annual renewals: "Com: Register $10.67, Renew $10.67, Transfer $10.67"; "Org: Register $14.00, Renew $14.00"; "Net: Register $16.50, Renew $16.50"; "Ai: Register $90.00, Renew…

Best for: Can you actually lose the name? — 4/10

Browse this network

Methodology

How this category is reviewed

Reviewed on how you could lose the name, whether the registry is onchain or a company namespace, whether your wallet resolves it without a plugin, and published renewal terms.

Reviewed on: Can you actually lose the name?, Onchain registry or company namespace, Does your wallet resolve it without a plugin, Published price, stable unit, stated renewal.

This page is a maintained category surface, not a static marketing block. Review freshness, provider positioning, and recommendation logic should stay consistent with quiz and provider pages.

Frequently asked

Questions people ask before choosing naming services

What counts as a naming service?

A naming service maps a human-readable name to an address. The differences that matter are not the suffix but the ownership model: whether the registry is a permissionless onchain contract or a company database, and what mechanism could take the name back.

When should I explore naming services instead of another crypto category?

It matters most when the name carries value — a brand, a payment handle, an identity. At that point 'lifetime' versus 'renewable' stops being a pricing detail and becomes the whole question.

What matters most when choosing a naming service path?

How you could lose it, and whether the registry is onchain — 65% of the weight between them. Wallet resolution follows, because a name nothing resolves is a collectible rather than an address.

REVIEWEDApr 2026METHOD4 criteriaCATEGORYnaming_services

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