"An open namespace with versatile meaning, the .connect TLD serves the businesses whose entire purpose is bringing people, organizations, and systems together.
Its mission is to provide a namespace for platforms and services built on connection: professional networks, community platforms, integration and API providers, telecommunications services, and event-driven networking. Intended registrants are technology platforms, communications providers, community organizations, and enterprises naming their partner and customer portals; intended users are the members, customers, and developers those platforms serve.
The TLD will enable portal addresses that describe their function (partners.connect), community-network identities, and integration-service branding in a market where ""connect"" is already the verb of choice for product names.
Distribution will run through accredited registrars.
Sustainability reflects the word's foundational role in the digital economy: connectivity products multiply with each platform generation, enterprise portal addresses are long-lived and renewal-stable, and the registry's conservative financial plan funds operations through year three with renewals sustaining it thereafter."
1. .CONNECT evokes the act of linking, joining, or establishing relationships between people, devices, networks, or ideas. The string suggests connection, connectivity, networking, and integration.
While registrations would be open without restriction, the .CONNECT namespace is expected to attract entities that establish, facilitate, or signify relationships across personal, professional, and technical domains. These include social and professional networking platforms; IoT device manufacturers and connectivity service providers; telecommunications companies; community groups and membership organizations; event and conference organizers; and any entity seeking to build or signify a relationship.
Related activities already carried out (or planned for launch) include: registry service provider evaluations, technical readiness for DNS stability and DNSSEC, IDN support, and ensuring providers meet benchmarks for resolution stability and query response time. Required rights protection mechanisms will include the Trademark Clearinghouse, Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy (UDRP), and Uniform Rapid Suspension (URS).
Having served a decade as Registry Operator for the .CAM gTLD, we have gathered extensive experience in registry operations, registrar communication, user awareness campaigns, and TLD promotion. We will leverage this expertise to make .CONNECT a success. It is a priority to offer best practice operations, best-in-class technical infrastructure, and full compliance with Registry Operator policy. All registry operations would comply with applicable privacy and data protection laws, and registrants would be required to adhere to lawful use standards. To further protect registrants and internet users, we work alongside trusted DNS services like CleanDNS for spam handling, registry-lock services, and rapid takedown mechanisms to respond to malicious use.
Communication with Registrars will commence as soon as possible to raise awareness, and ensure an effective launch of the .CONNECT TLD. Registration would be open on a first-come, first-served basis following extensive Sunrise and Landrush periods giving existing intellectual property rights owners the opportunity to secure and protect their names ahead of the general public. Followed by the outreach to networking and connectivity industry associations for the development of a .CONNECT usage. Attendance and participation at ICANN Meetings, and other relevant events, is planned.
2. The purpose of .CONNECT is to provide a dedicated namespace for establishing and signaling relationships — whether between people, devices, organizations, or ideas. The explosive growth of social networks, IoT devices, and remote collaboration tools underscores the demand for a namespace centered on connection.
This purpose is sustainable because connectivity is foundational to modern life and continues to expand across personal, professional, and technical domains. The widespread adoption of platforms like LinkedIn for professional networking, Zoom and Slack for remote collaboration, and the global expansion of IoT ecosystems demonstrates persistent and growing demand for digital connection, supporting a dedicated namespace for relationships and integration.
The .connect gTLD will provide a namespace for services and platforms that facilitate connections -- whether between people, devices, businesses, or communities. Registrations will be open to anyone.
Intended registrants include social networking platforms, telecommunications providers, IoT and device connectivity services, professional networking tools, event and matchmaking platforms, and community organizations.
This purpose is sustainable because connectivity is a core function of the internet and digital services, spanning telecommunications, social media, IoT, and enterprise collaboration.
The mission and purpose of .connect is to give individuals, businesses, and technology providers an open, generic namespace for anything built around linking people, devices, or systems together — from personal networking and community platforms to IoT device pairing, integration services, and communication tools. As an unrestricted gTLD, .connect is available to any registrant looking to signal a connection-oriented purpose.
The applicant will drive adoption of .connect through public relations outreach to technology, networking, and community-platform media, direct marketing to businesses, developers, and community organizers building connection-oriented products or services, partnership development with IoT platforms, communication tool providers, and networking organizations to secure anchor registrants, and coordinated promotion through the registrar channel to extend distribution and drive registration volume.
This purpose is sustainable over time because connecting people, devices, and systems is a foundational function of technology and society rather than a single trend, meaning demand for a namespace signaling connection-oriented purpose will persist regardless of which specific platforms, protocols, or industries drive that connectivity at any given time.
1. Mission and Purpose of the Applied-for gTLD
.connect helps membership groups, community organizations, and relationship-driven brands create a clear and memorable online presence for bringing people or services together, making it easier to be understood and trusted. It turns a mission built on relationships into a name that says exactly that. Instead of explaining what a site is for, the address does it in one word.
Intended Registrants: Businesses, community organizations, membership groups, event organizers, and technology brands that focus on bringing people, services, or audiences together.
Intended Users: Individuals and organizations seeking a web address that clearly signals a role in linking people to one another, to services, or to information.
Related Activities Supporting the Purpose: Activities that support the purpose of .connect include registrar distribution across general and business-focused channels, awareness-building among community and networking organizations, and registrant education that helps applicants choose names aligned to their linking or relationship-building role. Ongoing responsible registry operations support consistent availability and predictable use of the namespace.
.connect gives individuals, businesses, and organizations a web address that names one of their most fundamental activities: bringing parties together. Where a conventional domain simply points to a destination, a .connect address states an intent. It signals that the site exists to link members, pair people with services, unite communities around a shared interest, or introduce audiences to one another. This clarity is useful for membership networks, professional associations, referral services, matchmaking and introduction platforms, community hubs, and brands whose value lies in relationships rather than in a single product.
The namespace helps registrants create a recognizable presence built around the idea of coming together online. A regional business alliance, a mentorship program, a neighborhood group, or a company whose service brings buyers and sellers into contact can use a .connect name to describe what it does in a single, memorable word. For technology brands, the extension can serve as a clean, descriptive web address for offerings that bring people or services together, without implying that the domain itself performs any technical function.
2. Sustainability of the Purpose Over Time
The lasting relevance of .connect rests on identity and expression: the way people and organizations define themselves by the relationships they build and the parties they bring together. Connection is not a passing behavior tied to any single tool; it is how communities, markets, and institutions describe their reason for existing. A trade body exists to link an industry. A congregation, a club, or an alumni network defines itself by the members it unites. These roles are self-reinforcing: the more a group succeeds at bringing people together, the more central connection becomes to its identity, and the stronger its incentive to express that identity clearly.
Organizations continually need a way to state, in plain terms, that their purpose is to unite rather than merely to sell or inform. As new communities form, as industries reorganize, and as fresh membership and networking initiatives emerge, each one confronts the same task: representing itself as a meeting point. A naming layer built explicitly around connection speaks to that recurring need for self-representation in a way that generic naming cannot.
Because this durability is anchored in how groups represent their purpose rather than in any particular technology or market cycle, .connect stays meaningful across generations of organizations. The word describes an intent that communities and businesses will keep needing to declare, giving the namespace a stable foundation grounded in identity and expression.
The mission of .CONNECT is to provide a namespace associated with the concept of connect as establishing a link, relationship, or communication. The .CONNECT gTLD is intended to serve a broad range of registrants and users, including individuals, businesses, organizations, communities, projects, and other entities that identify with, relate to, or wish to be associated with the concept represented by the applied-for string.
The purpose of .CONNECT is to enable registrants to establish online identities using domain names that correspond to this concept. To achieve this purpose, Toddler Logic, LLC will make .CONNECT available for registration through registrars and other appropriate distribution channels; maintain a secure, stable, and reliable registry infrastructure; implement registration and operational policies that support the availability, security, and integrity of the namespace; and provide ongoing administration of the gTLD to enable registrants to register and use domain names within the namespace.
The purpose of .CONNECT is sustainable over time because establishing a link, relationship, or communication will continue to play a fundamental and enduring role across society and technology. As society, technology, and methods of communication evolve, organizations and individuals will continue to establish online identities associated with the applied-for string.
1. Mission and purpose. This gTLD will be operated as an open, unrestricted generic top-level domain. Its purpose is to expand naming choice in the DNS by making this term available at the top level for any lawful use chosen by the registrant. Registrations will be available to all registrants on a first-come, first-served basis through ICANN-accredited registrars, subject only to the Registry Agreement, ICANN Consensus Policies, and applicable law. The applicant will not operate this gTLD on an exclusive basis.
2. Intended registrants and users. Intended registrants are individuals, businesses, and other organizations worldwide seeking a short, meaningful domain name. There are no eligibility or name selection restrictions beyond those required by the Registry Agreement, ICANN Consensus Policies, and applicable law. Intended users are internet users worldwide who access domain names registered in this gTLD.
3. Related activities. The applicant is an established registry operator under contract with ICANN for 35 gTLDs, including .xyz. It has in place a qualified Registry Service Provider, distribution agreements with ICANN-accredited registrars across multiple regions, and all required rights protection mechanisms and DNS abuse mitigation practices. For this gTLD the applicant will onboard the TLD to its existing registry platform, conduct a Sunrise Period and Trademark Claims Period, launch General Availability through its registrar channel, and maintain ongoing registrar enablement, abuse monitoring, and compliance reporting.
4. Sustainability. Operation is funded by recurring registration and renewal revenue and does not depend on any single registrant, sector, or campaign. This gTLD will run on the applicant's existing shared registry infrastructure, so incremental operating cost is low and no minimum registration volume is required for viability. The applicant has operated gTLDs continuously since 2014.