GoDaddy Review: Should You Use Them for Domains?

Are you considering GoDaddy as your domain name registrar? Murray, our Lead Editor, shares his review of GoDaddy. Is it the right for you? Read on.

I’ve used GoDaddy for a dozen domain names throughout the years.

Each time I haven’t had an issue except one time renewing an expired domain (partially my fault for neglecting it). Unlike some, I’ve yet to have a truly hard time with their service.

I don’t remember why I chose GoDaddy, maybe it was the Super Bowl commercials. Either way, I’ve spent hundreds with them mainly for their domain name registration. I use other services, Bluehost, for web hosting so I’m skipping GoDaddy’s hosting and extra services in this review.

Despite its marketing fumbles, GoDaddy is still the #1 domain registrar. More than 77 million domain names are managed through their service. 18 million customers can’t be wrong, right?

What I’d like to do is focus on the main features in this review:

• Pricing
• Ease-of-use
• Customer service

All those other features – like hosting, digital marketing, and its website builder – will become a topic for later times. For now, I want to help you start a website… it begins with a domain.

What I Think about GoDaddy’s Domain Services

As I said:

I’ve used GoDaddy for most domains for my personal and business projects. Most domain registrars are about the same these days. Your search for a domain, buy it, and start building a site. They’re a basic service for my domain needs, I’m not trying to create a “relationship”, and they happen to be easy to use if you skip the upsells.

I think my only two complaints are:

1. Renewal pricing gets a little expensive (especially since you can’t really use coupons)
2. It’s easy to forget the auto-renew feature, suddenly dinging your account

A lot of people have major complaints about the service but I’m not one of them. I wouldn’t say they’re amazing, but I wouldn’t say they’re garbage, either.

Those are my opinions about the service. Let’s look at it objectively (as best I can).

Price

GoDaddy’s domain pricing is about what you’d find on many other registrars. They’re currently promoting a $2.99 domain with 2-year registration (and $14.99 2^nd-year renewal fee).

GoDaddy frequently runs promotions and deals for various domain extensions like .online, .world, .live, and all those random ones. I’d highly recommend using a GoDaddy coupon if this is your first time buying a domain through them as it’ll cut the costs even further.

Pricing Chart for GoDaddy Domains

Notice the “1st-year” note? GoDaddy bumps pricing back at the 2nd-year renewal. So, .com’s go back to the usual $14.99. I recommend checking the renewal rates for the TLD you want when factoring in whether you’ll use GoDaddy.

GoDaddy boasts a ton of different gTLDs (generic domains). Whether you want one of those is up to you but it’s always best to stick to .com or at least .net with your websites. A .org TLD is okay if you’re an organization, too.

Don’t see the domain you want?

GoDaddy has an auction, outreach, and backorder system. I haven’t tried these, but they would prove helpful if you’re adamant about a certain name. Otherwise, I say move on with a different name especially if you’re trying to keep to a tight budget.

Ease-of-Use

GoDaddy got a lot better about their upsells.

It used to be a real pain. They’d try hitting you with tons of upgrades and services. But now they only do privacy stuff and email.

Privacy protection is a smart decision if you don’t want to get spammed. I wish GoDaddy included this for free or at least had it a one-time thing. The $7.99/domain a year is a little absurd which is why I tend to forgo it and let Gmail handle my inbox.

These upsell’s slow you down a little and I can see where new domain buyers could get tricked. Scroll to the bottom and make sure everything is unchecked, basically, unless you really need that upgrade.

GoDaddy Backend

GoDaddy’s backend is a little clunky but it’s better than a few years ago. They’ve streamlined a lot of it. You can easily access your domains, request customer service, set funding, and all that without having to know too much about account systems.

Since GoDaddy is my main registrar, I find it easy to point domains to a host. The nameservers are accessible under the specific domain and it takes a few moments to copy & paste. Transferring a domain to a new host is a little tricky but it provides full documentation, so I don’t think you’ll have trouble.

The only other annoying thing is how cluttered payment accounts can get. I tend to forget to link my PayPal and cards when buying domains with GoDaddy. This then displays dozens of options, leading me to enter new information because I won’t clear the older ones. This is more of a personal thing, I guess.

Customer Service

GoDaddy customer service is spot-on from my experience.

There’s only been one time I remember needing to email the company. This was my fault for not paying attention to how many years I was renewing a domain – they responded fast, reverting the payment and setting it to my original intentions.

GoDaddy has 8K+ employees with many of them dedicated to customer service. Take that as a positive sign, handling tons of inquiries. Or, maybe it’s a sign they get a lot of complaints and customer troubles?

Either way, GoDaddy is there 24/7/365 via email, live chat, social, and phone.

Their community forum is helpful, too.

I doubt you’ll need to contact customer service if all you’re doing is buying a domain. Though, who knows? Maybe you will. At Least GoDaddy is readily available if you do run into some snags.

Extras

GoDaddy also offers:

• Websites – Site building tools, eCommerce platform, and website templates
• WordPress – WP hosting and themes, support, and web designer outreach
• Hosting – Web and business hosting, WP hosting, VPS, and dedicated servers
• Web Security – SSL certificates, backups, and malware removal
• Online Marketing – SEO, business listings, email marketing, and social
• Email & Office – Email, Microsoft Office, and bookkeeping
• Phone Numbers – Secondary phone and toll-free numbers

Out of these, I’ve used their email service. It wasn’t bad but it’s not as smooth as Gmail though I suppose you could link the two for simplicity. I had entertained the phone number, too, but found Google has a cheaper option.

I do hear decent things about their hosting and website builder. Someone wanting an all-in-one service probably won’t go wrong picking GoDaddy for these extended services.

Verdict

I can’t say much about the other features and services because I only use GoDaddy for domain registration. My experience with them has been pleasant minus a few hiccups.

Do I recommend GoDaddy for domains? Yes.

To summarize:

• Affordable pricing
• Slightly annoying checkout
• 24/7/365 service
• Lots of good extras

Some don’t like GoDaddy, but I do.

I think they’re a good service if this is your first time buying a domain. But, do your own research and take advantage of that guarantee if you’re not satisfied.