.site domains: who runs the registry, and who can register

Radix Technologies Inc. SEZC, a Cayman Islands company, is the sponsoring organisation on record for .site with IANA. That same entity, Radix Technologies Inc SEZC, is named as operator on the ICANN Registry Agreement signed 15 January 2015 (Base, Non-Sponsored). IANA's records show two internal transfers of the sponsoring entity since then: first to Radix FZC in 2021, then back to Radix Technologies Inc in 2024. Both moves stayed inside the same corporate group, so nothing about actual control changed.

The technical backend changed in 2025. Radix announced in August 2025 that Tucows Registry would take over back-end services for its portfolio, and the IANA record now lists Tucows.com, Co. as technical contact on Tucows nameservers. Radix's own policies page still names CentralNic Ltd, the previous provider, so expect that page to lag. ICANN sits above all this as the policy authority, the body whose Registry Agreement dictates what Radix can and can't do in running .site.

Three distinct roles are worth keeping straight. The registry, Radix, holds the master database and sets registration policy and pricing tiers. The registrar, a business like Namecheap or GoDaddy, is who you actually buy the name from and manage it through day to day. The registrant is you: the person or organisation holding the registration, bound by both the registry's rules and whatever terms your registrar bolts on top.

The dossier doesn't mention any eligibility rule specific to .site. Nobody's asking you to hold a trademark, prove where you live, or show ties to a particular trade. That puts .site in with the vast majority of generic top-level domains rather than the restricted ones.

Registry rules did shape things at launch, even though there's no ongoing gate now. Radix's Launch Policy laid out a Sunrise phase for trademark holders verified through the Trademark Clearinghouse, then a Landrush phase, then general availability on a first-come, first-served basis. All of that is history at this point. General availability has been the rule for years, so those launch phases have nothing to do with registering a name today.

Registrar practice sits on top of this. A registrar might run its own checks, payment verification, WHOIS contact accuracy, that sort of thing, before it'll finish a registration. Radix also runs a premium names programme across its portfolio, so some strings carry different pricing set at the registry level, not because of any eligibility test. Best to confirm a given name's status with a registrar listed on get.site rather than assume standard pricing applies.

.site domains come with a minimum one-year registration term, as set out in Radix's Launch Policy, which covers all Radix-operated TLDs, not just .site. What the dossier doesn't confirm is a maximum term for .site specifically.

Transferring a .site domain between registrars works the same way it does for any generic top-level domain: you need an authorisation code from the losing registrar, an unlock at your current one, and confirmation at the gaining registrar. That's an ICANN-wide rule, and Radix doesn't add a separate layer of documentation for .site on top of it. New registrations and recent registrant changes have historically triggered a transfer lock, though ICANN has been reworking that rule across the industry. Whether or how that change lands for .site isn't detailed in the sources reviewed here.

What actually happens when a .site name lapses isn't spelled out in the Radix policy pages available in this dossier either. Generic top-level domains usually run through a renewal grace period, then a redemption period with a restore fee attached, before the name is finally deleted and released. But Radix hasn't published its own figures for .site, no grace length, no redemption cost, no restore fee, in the sources checked here. If you need exact timings or restore costs for a .site domain, confirm them with your registrar. Don't assume the generic industry norms carry over unchanged.