Domains with Special Policies » About .fr Domains

This page explains special requirements for domains with the .fr extension.

Who can register .fr domains?

Individuals and organizations located in the European Union, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland, and Liechtenstein may register .fr domain names. Individuals must reside within one of the qualifying countries. Organizations must have their registered or main office located in a qualifying country.

Registrant Name Restrictions

Special characters are not allowed in the first and last name fields of contacts – this includes characters with diacritical marks. The acceptable syntax is listed below:

• latin [characters with the exception of numbers and special characters]
• hyphens
• apostrophes
• spaces

Organizational Registrants

If you select an organization registrant type, generally you must provide additional information which may include any of the following:

• VAT Number—The Value Added Tax (VAT) number of the organization.
• Trademark Number—The organization’s trademark registration number.
• SIREN/SIRET Number—The 9 digit SIREN code or the 14 digit SIRET code that is used to identify the business for tax reasons. For organizations located in France, please include this number to avoid validation issues with the registry.

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Privacy Protection

Afnic, the registry that governs all .fr domains, automatically applies privacy protection to .fr domains if the domain is registered to an individual. This limits the personal information that is displayed in the Whois database.

However, for domains registered to organizations, privacy protection is not supported. This means that the registrant contact information is displayed in the Whois database.

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Renewal Restrictions

If we cannot auto-renew the domain name and you do not manually renew it before it reaches expiration, there is no grace period and the domain goes immediately into redemption and additional fees apply. The redemption period lasts approximately 30 days. Once this period is over, it is no longer possible to redeem or renew the domain.

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Transfers

Transferring to another registrar

You must initiate the transfer with the gaining registrar, who will require the registrant to provide an authorization code for the transfer. You need to allow 8 days for the transfer to complete.

Incoming transfers

We do not currently accept incoming domain transfers for .fr domains. Please use the Domain Connection option instead.