Register a .us domain
The official country code for the United States — a clear American signal.
.us is the country-code domain of the United States, and it does one thing exceptionally well: it tells visitors, instantly, that a business or service is American. For a company rooted in the US market — or one selling into it — that geographic signal builds local trust in a way a generic ending cannot. There is one important condition: .us has a US-nexus requirement, so the registrant must have a genuine connection to the United States. If you or your organisation qualify, .us is a short, memorable, unmistakably American address at a transparent price on HostCloud.
Registration
₹799/yr
Renewal: …
Transfer: …
Live pricing from our registry. WHOIS privacy, DNS hosting and email forwarding included — registration price equals renewal.
What a .us domain is
.us is the official country-code top-level domain (ccTLD) for the United States, delegated in the internet's naming system to represent the country the same way .in represents India or .uk the United Kingdom. It was established in the 1980s and, after a reorganisation in the early 2000s, opened up for general registration under a US-based registry operator, GoDaddy Registry, under the oversight of the US Department of Commerce's NTIA.
Because it is a country code, .us is not a neutral global ending — it carries a specific national identity by design. That is its entire value proposition: a .us address says "United States" without a word of explanation, which is exactly what a domestic American business, a US government-adjacent service, or an overseas company with a real US presence often wants to communicate.
Crucially, .us is not unrestricted. To register a .us domain you must satisfy the US-nexus requirement: the registrant needs to be a US citizen or permanent resident, a US-based entity or organisation, or a foreign individual or business with a bona-fide presence in the United States — for example, a genuine office, subsidiary or ongoing commercial activity there. This requirement is a defining feature of the extension rather than a formality, and it is part of what keeps .us feeling authentically American. If you meet it, the domain is short, credible and available for a wide range of names that are long gone on .com.
Your domain is more than a web address
It is your brand's first impression, your professional email, and a digital asset that appreciates in value. Here is what registering with HostCloud gives you.
Transparent pricing
Pricing you can actually trust
What you see is what you pay. First-year pricing and renewal pricing are shown upfront, with no hidden fees and no renewal shocks two years down the line the number you sign up at is the number you renew at.
Same on renewal No bait-and-switch your renewal price matches your signup price, every year.
One invoice Domain, hosting and email billed together on a single renewal date.
Domain pricing
Transparent
✓ Renewal price = signup price. No hidden fees.
Free WHOIS privacy
Your details, kept private
Your name, address, email and phone are publicly visible in WHOIS databases unless you pay for protection. We include it free on every domain so spammers, scammers and competitors cannot harvest your personal information.
Hidden by default Registrant details are masked the moment your domain is registered.
Less spam Investors and scrapers can no longer pull your contact info from WHOIS.
WHOIS privacy
Protected
✓ Included free your details stay out of public WHOIS.
Easy DNS management
Point your domain anywhere
Update A, CNAME, MX and TXT records from a clean control panel and point your domain at any hosting provider in minutes. Configure subdomains, email routing and more with a real India-based team on hand when you need it.
Any host, minutes Full record control from one panel no waiting, no support ticket required.
Local India support DNS questions, propagation issues and transfers handled by people who answer.
DNS records
Live
Brand protection
Own your name completely
Register your brand across multiple TLDs .in, .com, .co.in, .net from the start, so a competitor or squatter can never grab it and demand payment. One dashboard, complete control over your digital identity.
Lock out squatters Secure the variants that matter before someone else registers them.
No extortion risk You keep full ownership and control of every version of your brand.
Brand portfolio
Secured
Who it’s for
Who a .us is for
Register a .us if you have a genuine connection to the United States and want that identity front and centre. It suits American small businesses, local shops and service providers whose customers are entirely domestic; US-based startups that want a patriotic or clearly national brand; state, city and community organisations; and creators or professionals who live in the US and want an address that reflects it. It also fits non-US companies that maintain a bona-fide US presence — an incorporated subsidiary, a physical office, or real ongoing business there — and want a domain that speaks to American customers. The key filter is eligibility: because of the US-nexus requirement, .us is not for a business with no real link to the country. If you do qualify, the payoff is a short, trustworthy, unmistakably American name — often available where the equivalent .com is taken — that signals local presence to the audience that matters most.
Best suited for
- US small businesses and local service providers
- American startups wanting a clearly national brand
- State, city and community organisations
- Foreign companies with a bona-fide US presence
- Creators and professionals based in the United States
- Short, American-flavoured names unavailable on .com
Real ways a .us earns its place
Where a .us does its best work — and why it is worth owning.
Use case 01
A local signal for an American small business
For a business that serves customers within the United States, a .us address puts national identity right in the domain. A hardware store, a regional service company or a local eatery on cityname-hardware.us reads as unmistakably American, which reassures domestic customers that they are dealing with a business in their own country — a real factor in trust, delivery expectations and support. Because .us has far fewer registrations than .com, short and descriptive names are often still available, so you can secure a clean, memorable address without resorting to a padded workaround. Provided you meet the US-nexus requirement — as any US-based business does — registration is quick, and paired with HostCloud hosting and a free SSL certificate you get a professional, patriotically named site that speaks directly to an American audience.
Expert support
India-based
Avg response
< 15 min
Resolved
< 2 hrs
Use case 02
A US presence for an overseas company
A company headquartered outside the United States but doing genuine business there — through a US subsidiary, a local office, or established commercial activity — can use a .us to present a properly American face to that market. Customers in the US often respond better to a domestic-looking address than to a foreign ccTLD, and a .us signals that you have a real footing in the country rather than shipping from afar. This only works if the connection is bona fide: the US-nexus requirement exists precisely to prevent purely foreign entities from claiming an American identity they do not have. If your US presence is real, a dedicated .us site — separate from your home-country domain — lets you tailor pricing, shipping and messaging for American buyers while borrowing the credibility the country code confers, all managed from a single HostCloud dashboard.
Auto-renewal
Enabled
✓ Your domain never expires by accident.
Use case 03
A civic, community or public-facing project
The .us space has a long association with American localities and institutions, and it remains a natural home for civic and community projects: a neighbourhood association, a local sports league, a school club, a town event or a public-information effort. A .us address frames the project as part of the American civic fabric in a way a generic ending never could, and the country code lends a quiet officialness that suits public-facing work. Because these projects are usually run by US residents or US-based groups, the nexus requirement is comfortably met. The low cost makes it easy for a volunteer-run initiative to maintain a proper web home year after year, and with HostCloud you can attach the domain, publish the information, and secure it with a free SSL certificate so visitors see a trusted, locked address.
WHOIS privacy
Protected
✓ Included free your details stay out of public WHOIS.
The details worth knowing about .us
US-nexus requirement: registrants must be a US citizen or resident, a US-based organisation, or a foreign entity with a bona-fide US presence.
It is a true country-code TLD, so it carries a specific American identity — not a neutral global signal.
Operated by GoDaddy Registry under US Department of Commerce (NTIA) oversight.
At HostCloud the registration price equals the renewal price — no first-year teaser that jumps later.
Free WHOIS privacy, DNS hosting and email forwarding are included on every .us.
Short, descriptive names are often still available on .us where the .com equivalent is long gone.
Everything that makes a .us work
SEO and branding, setup on HostCloud, and how it stacks up against the alternatives.
SEO & branding
What .us means for SEO and branding
As a country-code domain, .us can send a geographic signal that search engines associate with the United States, which can help a site aimed squarely at an American audience appear more relevant for US-based searches. That is the main SEO nuance: unlike a neutral generic ending, a ccTLD tends to be read as tied to its country, so a .us reinforces that your target market is the US. The flip side is that this same signal makes .us a poor choice if you want to rank globally — it quietly tells search engines and users your focus is national.
For branding, .us is direct and confident: the address itself declares American identity, which builds domestic trust for local businesses, civic projects and US-facing services. The trade-off is specificity — a .us is not the neutral, worldwide default that .com is, so it suits a business that wants to be seen as American rather than global. Choose it when a clear US identity is an asset, back it with content written for an American audience, and the country code and your copy will pull in the same direction.
Brand portfolio
Secured
Register & set up
Registering and setting up your .us
Registering a .us with HostCloud takes a couple of minutes. Search your name below, confirm you meet the US-nexus requirement — as a US citizen, resident, US-based organisation, or a foreign entity with a genuine US presence — and if the name is available you can secure it with WHOIS privacy switched on by default. There is no lengthy verification queue; the domain is live as soon as registration completes.
From your dashboard you get full DNS control: point the .us at HostCloud hosting or any other provider by editing A, CNAME, MX and TXT records from one clean panel. This is where you connect your website, and where you would set up American-market tools if you run a separate US storefront. Professional email such as [email protected] is a matter of adding the MX records for your mailbox or using the included forwarding. If you host with us, attaching the domain and issuing a free SSL certificate so the site loads over HTTPS is a one-click step — essential for any commercial site handling American customers. Already own the .us elsewhere? Transfer it in and keep domain, DNS, hosting and email on a single renewal date with India-based support.
DNS records
Live
How it compares
.us vs .com and .co
.us and .com answer different questions. .com is the neutral, globally recognised default and the safest anchor for a brand that wants to look international; .us is a country code that deliberately signals "American." If your audience is worldwide, the .com is usually the primary. If your audience is specifically in the United States — and you meet the nexus requirement — a .us can build stronger local trust and is often available for names the .com lost years ago.
Against .co, the difference is meaning versus geography. .co reads as a short, modern stand-in for "company" or "commerce" and carries no national identity, appealing to startups that want a sleek global-ish ending; .us plants a clear American flag. The two are not mutually exclusive: a US business might register the .com as its global anchor and hold the .us to reinforce domestic identity, redirecting whichever it does not lead with. The deciding factor is how much you want your address to say "United States" — and whether you qualify to register it.
Domain pricing
Transparent
✓ Renewal price = signup price. No hidden fees.
How real brands put .us to work
cityname-hardware.us
American local business
brand-usa.us
US market site for an overseas company
townleague.us
Community or civic project
Pricing & renewals
At HostCloud a standard .us is priced so the registration fee and the renewal fee are the same — there is no low first-year rate that jumps at renewal. WHOIS privacy, DNS hosting and email forwarding are all included at no extra cost. Because .us has fewer registrations than .com, premium pricing is less common and many short, descriptive names remain available at the standard rate; where a name is classed as premium the live search will show it. The search below always displays the real price for the exact name you type, and you can register a .us for several years at once to lock in today's rate. Remember that eligibility depends on meeting the US-nexus requirement.
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Got Questions? We Have Answers.
Who is allowed to register a .us domain?
You must meet the US-nexus requirement: be a US citizen or permanent resident, a US-based entity or organisation, or a foreign individual or company with a bona-fide presence in the United States, such as a genuine office, subsidiary or ongoing commercial activity there.
Can a non-US business register a .us?
Only if it has a real, bona-fide connection to the United States — for example an incorporated US subsidiary, a physical US office, or established commercial activity in the country. A business with no genuine US presence does not qualify, as the nexus requirement is a real condition, not a formality.
Is .us good for SEO?
It can help if you are targeting the United States, because a country-code domain sends a geographic signal search engines associate with that country. The trade-off is that the same signal makes .us less suitable if you want to rank globally rather than nationally.
Does the .us renewal cost more than the first year?
Not at HostCloud. The price to register is the same price to renew, with no promotional first-year rate and no later increase. You can register for multiple years to lock in the current rate.
Are short .us names easier to get than .com?
Often, yes. Because .us has far fewer registrations than .com, many short and descriptive names that are long gone on .com are still available on .us at the standard price. The live search shows what is free for any name you try.
Can I set up email on a .us domain?
Yes. Once the .us is registered you can create professional mailboxes such as [email protected], or use the included email forwarding, by adding the relevant MX records from your HostCloud dashboard.