A sponsored TLD (sTLD) is a specialised extension run on behalf of a defined community by a sponsoring organisation that sets the eligibility rules — for example .aero (aviation), .coop (cooperatives), .museum (museums), .travel (travel industry), .jobs (HR), .post (postal sector), plus the government-grade .gov, .edu and .int. Unlike open generic TLDs, you can only register one if you belong to the community.
What "sponsored" means
When ICANN expanded the namespace in the early 2000s, it created two categories of new generic extension: unsponsored (open, like .biz and .info) and sponsored. A sponsored TLD is delegated to a sponsoring organisation — a body that represents a defined community and is responsible for setting eligibility and naming policy on that community's behalf. The aviation industry sponsors .aero; the cooperative movement sponsors .coop; museums sponsor .museum. The sponsor, not the open market, decides who qualifies. This is what makes an sTLD a trust signal — and why it overlaps heavily with our restricted TLDs list.
Sponsored TLDs reference list
The community served and the sponsoring/administering organisation. Categorisation reflects historical sTLD designations.
| Extension | Sponsored community | Sponsor / operator |
|---|---|---|
| .aero | Air-transport industry | SITA |
| .asia | Pan-Asia / Asia-Pacific community | DotAsia Organisation |
| .cat | Catalan language & culture | Fundació puntCAT |
| .coop | Cooperatives | DotCooperation |
| .edu | US-accredited education | Educause |
| .gov | US government | CISA |
| .int | Intergovernmental treaty bodies | IANA |
| .jobs | Human-resources / employment | Employ Media |
| .mil | US military | DoD NIC |
| .mobi | Mobile-optimised sites (legacy) | Operated under Identity Digital |
| .museum | Museums | MuseDoma |
| .post | Postal sector | Universal Postal Union |
| .tel | Contact-data publishing (legacy) | Telnic |
| .travel | Travel & tourism industry | Dog Beach (registry) |
| .xxx | Adult-entertainment community | ICM Registry |
Sponsor/operator names reflect the registry of record and may change through registry transfers; verify via the IANA root zone database. The 2012 new-gTLD program blurred the sponsored/unsponsored line, so several community-restricted new gTLDs behave like sTLDs.
sTLD vs gTLD vs restricted — how they relate
The categories overlap. Every sTLD is a kind of generic TLD (it sits in the gTLD space, not the country-code space), and most sTLDs are also restricted because the sponsoring community gates eligibility. The distinction worth remembering: "sponsored" describes governance (a community body oversees it), while "restricted" describes access (you must qualify). A few sponsored extensions — like .asia or .cat — are relatively easy to register if you have a loose community connection, while .gov and .edu are tightly verified. For the open mainstream, see the generic TLD list; for the country-code space, the ccTLD list.