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Fast 2025 Start for Domains Continues with Multiple 6-Figure Sales and More Fireworks from .AI

The first month of the 2025 domain sales season is now in the books and if the next 11 are like this, there will be a lot of happy campers in the aftermarket. Over the past couple of weeks, five more six-figure sales have been publicly reported (and far more were completed under NDAs). We also saw another big wave of .AI sales with nine of those flooding our latest all extension Top 20 Sales Chart (including one that is a member of that 6-Figure club). 

The headliner is an eye-popping $431,400 sale of Fanbase.com. One thing of particular interest about this sale 

is where it took place. That was on the Fruits.co platform that many of you (especially in the U.S.) might not be familiar with yet. Fruits.co is an aftermarket sales platform that just launched last year and already has over 1 million listings. The innovative site, based in Munich, was built by some of the industry's most successful Europe-based entrepreneurs and investors (I've known some of them for over 15 years and will be sharing all of the details about their latest venture in an upcoming article). Fruits.co joins a number of impressive new marketplaces that have risen since GoDaddy bought DAN.com and merged that popular platform into Afternic

Also making big news this time out is Sedo's £300,000 ($375,000) sale of #2 Tyres.co.uk. That is not just the highest ccTLD sale of the new year, it is bigger than any country code sale reported all of last year when Girlfriend.ai at $274,610 led the final ccTLD Top 100 Chart. Namecheap gave the ccTLD's another 2025 headliner with their $100,000 sale of #5 Tether.ai. Namecheap, who just started a daily .ai auction, went on to put six more .ai domains on the leader board, with .ai filling nine spots overall.  

 ...and the hits just keep on coming, the two top 5 sales between Tyres.co.uk and Tether.ai both went to Kate Buckley's busy brokerage at Defining.com. They closed a $176,943 sale of #3 Candidly.com and a $101,900 sale of #4 VirtualAssistants.com. But wait - there's more! They also closed a six-figure deal for Hilo.com that was under an NDA, so the exact price hasn't been revealed. I just saw Kate and her partner Todd Henderson last week at the 2025 ICA Annual Meeting in Las Vegas. They are always smiling, but this would explain the especially big smiles at our latest get together.

One other note before we go to the bi-weekly Top 20 - now that we have a full month's worth's of sales data in, we have published our first 2025 Year-to-Date Top Sales Charts. The final Top 100 Chart for 2024 has now taken up permanent residence in our Domain Sales Archive where it will always remain available for reference.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

           By Ron Jackson

Now, here is how all of the leaders stacked up for the two weeks ending Sunday, Feb. 2, 2025

The DN Journal Top 20 
Highest Reported Domain Sales - Mon. Jan. 20 - Sun. Feb. 2, 2025
(Foreign currency to U.S. Dollar Conversions Based on Rates in Effect Feb. 5, 2025)

 

Domain

Sold For

Where Sold

1.

Fanbase.com

$431,400 Fruits.co
2. Tyres.co.uk £300,000 = $375,000 Sedo
3. Candidly.com $176,943 Defining.com
4. VirtualAssistants.com $101,900 Defining.com
5. Tether.ai