.uk
".co.uk", ".org.uk" and ".ac.uk" all redirect here. For short decriptions of the actual sub-domains themselves, see the Second-level domains section below. Top level domain|name=.uk|background=#CCF|image=
|
Nominet.uk -- The UK Internet names organization |
|introduced=
1985|type=
Country code top-level domain|status=Active|registry=
Nominet UK|sponsor=
Nominet UK|intendeduse=Entities connected with
United Kingdom|actualuse=Very popular in UK, especially
.co.uk subdomain - as of May 2006 there were 5,039,470 registrations [
1]|restrictions=None for
.co.uk and
.org.uk; other subdomains have differing restrictions|structure=Second-level registrations prohibited (but a few old ones grandfathered); registration is at third level beneath generic-category 2nd level domains except under
.sch.uk where registration is at fourth level|document=|disputepolicy=
DRS Policy|website=
nic.uk|}}
.uk is the
Internet country code top-level domain (
ccTLD) for the
United Kingdom.
The use of .uk rather than
.gb for the
top-level domain is due to its pre-existing use in the (now obsolete)
JANET Name Registration Scheme in which the order of address components were reversed. .uk was made available in
DNS to simplify the translation to and from these addresses. There were plans for eventual transition to .gb, but this never occurred and the use of .uk is now entrenched.
As with other
ccTLDs in the early days it was originally delegated to an
individual by
Jon Postel. In time, it passed to (
Dr Willie Black) at the UK Education and Research Networking Association (
UKERNA). Domain requests were emailed to - and manually screened by - the
UK Naming Committee before being processed by
UKERNA. This
Committee was in practice a mailing list of
representatives of all organisations involved in the UK
Internet system at the time.
By the mid-
1990s the growth of the
Internet, and particularly the
advent of the
World Wide Web was pushing requests for
domain name registrations up to levels that were not manageable by a group of part-time voluntary managers. Oliver Smith of
Demon Internet forced the issue by providing the committee with a series of automated tools, called the "automaton", which formalized and automated the naming process end to end. This allowed many more registrations to be processed far more reliably and rapidly, and inspired individuals such as
Ivan Pope to explore more entrepreneurial approaches to registration.
Various plans were put forward for the possible management of the domain, mostly
ISPs seeking to stake a claim, each of which were naturally unacceptable to the rest of the committee. In response to this Dr Black, as the .uk Name, stepped up with a bold proposal for a not-for-profit commercial entity to deal with the .uk domain properly. Commercial interests initially balked at this, but with widespread support
Nominet UK was formed to be the .uk Network Information Centre, a role which it continues to this day.
The general form of the rules (i.e. which domains can be registered and whether to allow second level domains) was set by the Naming Committee. Nominet has not made major changes to the rules, although it has introduced a new second level domain .me.uk for individuals.
It is prohibited to register a domain name directly under .uk (such as
.internet.uk) and a second-level domain must be used (such as
internet.co.uk).
However, some domains delegated before the creation of Nominet UK remain. Examples include
parliament.uk (
Parliament),
bl.uk and
british-library.uk (the
British Library),
nls.uk (the
National Library of Scotland),
nhs.uk (), and
jet.uk (
UKAEA as operator of the
Joint European Torus experimental fusion
tokamak). No new 'normal' registrations at the second level are accepted although there is a system for allocating new second level domains to expand the capacity of the system. Such allocations are rarely made.
It is possible to directly register a domain name with
Nominet UK but it is faster and cheaper to do it via a Nominet tag holder.
*.ac.uk - academic (tertiary education and research establishments) and
learned societies.
*.co.uk - commercial/general
*.gov.uk - government (central and local)
*.ltd.uk -
limited companies*
.me.uk - personal
*.mod.uk -
Ministry of Defence and
HM Forces public sites
*.net.uk - ISPs and network companies
*.nic.uk - network use only
*.nhs.uk -
National Health Service institutions
*.org.uk - non-profit organisations
*.plc.uk - public limited companies
*.police.uk - police forces
*.sch.uk - schools, primary and secondary education
*
.soc.uk - proposed for Social and Society use.
*
.me.uk - the PDN version - similar to the one that was chosen but outsourced to the proposer.
*
.scot.uk - A domain for Scotland; it did not have the support of the Scottish internet community, many of whom favour a wholly separate Scottish ccTLD (see
.sco). It was another attempt to outsource an SLD to the proposer.
*
.bl.uk and
.british-library.uk -
British Library*
.icnet.uk -
Imperial Cancer Research Fund*
.jet.uk -
Joint European Torus*
.nel.uk -
National Engineering Laboratory (now TÜV NEL)
*
.nls.uk and .national-library-scotland.uk -
National Library of Scotland*
.parliament.uk -
Parliament of the United Kingdom (the placement of parliament.uk outside of .gov.uk reflects the British
constitutional convention of the importance of
parliamentary sovereignty over, and independence from, the executive government. Note that .scottish.parliament.uk relates to the devolved
Scottish Parliament, not to part of the UK Parliament.)
*
.govt.uk - former government domain, now deleted and replaced by .gov.uk
*
.orgn.uk - former non-profit organisations domain, now deleted and replaced by .org.uk
*
.mil.uk - former
Ministry of Defence domain, now deleted and replaced by .mod.uk
*
.lea.uk -
local education authorities; since fallen out of use.
.co.uk, .ltd.uk, .me.uk, .net.uk, .nic.uk, .org.uk, .plc.uk and .sch.uk are managed by
Nominet UK and except for .nic.uk are available for registration by the public (though they all carry various degrees of restrictions). The other second-level domains are managed by various government agencies, and generally more strongly controlled.
Allocations are on a strict
first-come, first-served basis to qualified applicants. There are no territorial restrictions: applicants need not have any connection to the
UK.
.co.uk is by far the most used of the domains, followed by .org.uk. .plc.uk and .ltd.uk are only rarely used.
The intended restriction of .co.uk to companies are purely nominal; in practice it is open to any and all applicants. Likewise, whilst .org.uk is for organisations, there are no restrictions on registering domains. While .me.uk originally had no restrictions on registrants it has since been tightened up to require registrants to be natural persons (i.e. not companies, etc).
However, registrants in .ltd.uk must be, and remain, private limited companies incorporated under the
UK Companies Act 1985. In addition, names can only be registered if they correspond (in accordance with the algorithm in the rules of registration) with the exact company name, as recorded at the companies registry at
Companies House. The same conditions apply for .plc.uk, but for public limited companies. Neither of these domains are widely used.
.net.uk is more open, but the Nominet regulations still mean that a registrant must be an ISP, or a similar body, and that the domain is not used for providing services to end-users. .nic.uk, however, is limited solely to domains operated by Nominet.
.ac.uk domains are intended for the use of higher education institutions (beyond compulsory education age), and are also used by some academic support bodies such as the
Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (
www.ucas.ac.uk), public research establishments, and
learned societies such as the
Royal Society (
royalsoc.ac.uk) and the
Royal Institution (
ri.ac.uk). Primary and secondary education uses .sch.uk.
Unusually, .sch.uk domains are allocated at the fourth level, with the third level being taken up by the name of the
local education authority (LEA) e.g. someschool.lea.sch.uk. For example, Tiffin School in
Kingston upon Thames has the web address
www.tiffin.kingston.sch.uk. Previously applications were made in the normal way, but after Nominet came to an arrangement with the education authorities, one domain per school was issued automatically.
*
.gb*
.sco*
IANA .uk whois information*
.uk registry website*
List of Nominet UK tag holder
