Internationalized Domain Names

Do you have a non-English website?

If so, an internationalized domain name could be exactly what you need!

Internationalized Domain Names (IDN) enable you to have a domain name expressed in the same language as your non-english website. Also referred to as International Domain Names, IDNs are Internet domain names that contain non-ASCII characters.

Internationalized Domain Names can contain diacritics, as well as characters from non-Latin scripts, such as Arabic, Hebrew, Chinese or Hindu.

Example of an Internationalized Domain Name

The following example shows the english version of a domain name, then a russian version. The russian version is an internationalized domain name.

Note that these are two different domain names. If you wanted both domains, you would need to register each one as a separate domain name.

Register an Internationalized Domain Name

You can register international domain names with ZappyHost. To register your IDN, go to the Internationalized Domain Name search page and select your language.

ZappyHost allows you to register .COM, .NET, .ORG, .INFO, .BIZ and .TW domain names in over 100 native languages (non-ASCII characters) such as Chinese, Japanese and Arabic or in standard ASCII character format.

You can register your internationalized domain name using the native language characters or standard punycode character format. If you enter the language characters, ZappyHost will convert it to punycode and register the punycode version with the registry.

What is Punycode?

Punycode is an encoding syntax designed for use with Internationalized Domain Names in Applications (IDNA).

Using punycode, non-ASCII characters are converted into a format which uses only ASCII characters. This method allows a unique and reversible identification of the original domain. Punycode converted domain names are prefixed with 'xn--'.

Here's an example of a punycode converted domain name:

Both of these domains represent the same domain name. By registering one, you are also registering the other. You can use either the native language or the punycode version when registering your international domain name.

Viewing Internationalized Domain Names

To view characters in an internationalized domain, you must adjust your language settings in your Web browser. If you can't see the characters, you may need to install the foreign language pack.