Today the EU’s internet address turns ten years old. Since 7 April 2006 .eu has provided a unique European domain for people and organisations in the EU. At the end of 2015 .eu was the eleventh largest top-level domain in the world[1], with almost 4 million domain names, with the most registrants in Germany (1 million), the Netherlands (497,000), France (343,000), Poland (308,000) and the United Kingdom (307,000).
Vice-President Ansip, in charge of the Digital Single Market[2], said in his blog [3]:
“I am pleased to see that more and more users are choosing the .eu domain, which connects more than 500 million people to one internet identity, across the 28 countries of the European Union as well as in Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway. A .eu website gives confidence and security to whoever is using it.”
From its origins, .eu has been administered by EURid, a non-profit organisation that operates on behalf of the Commission[4].
Many organisations and companies have adopted .eu in Europe, have a look at .eu success stories [5].
.eu is catching up both with the top level domains that have existed since the late nineties, such as .com, .info, .net and .org and is competing with new top-level domains introduced in 2014 such as .guru, .expert, .book or .london.
[2] An environment where digital networks and services can prosper
[4] EURid