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Fifty-six orgs get 85% off their gTLD fees

Kevin Murphy, August 28, 2026, 06:54:41 (UTC), Domain Policy

ICANN has revealed the final statistics for its Applicant Support Program, the deal that sees non-profits and others get up to 85% off their $227,000 new gTLD application fees.

The number of qualified, fully confirmed applicants topped out at 56, from 78 submitted applications. Four were withdrawn, three were found ineligible for support, and 15 were “terminated” for failing to pull the final trigger before the August 12 cut-off date.

The major question arising from the final stats is whether ICANN met its ambition of bringing in more applicants from less-developed economies, particularly those in the Global South or indigenous peoples.

Only one application was approved from the Latin America and Caribbean region — which includes every nation in the western hemisphere south of the US-Mexico border. That applicant fit into the “Micro/Small Business From a Less-Developed Economy” category.

That’s the kind of statistic likely to raise eyebrows when ICANN’s Governmental Advisory Committee meets to dissect the results of the program.

There was also only one approved applicant in the “Indigenous/Tribal People’s Organization” category. That applicant came from the Asia-Pacific region, which could indicate any number of minority ethnic groups in dozens of countries.

Africa fared a little better, with six small businesses and one non-profit getting approved for the discounts. Asia-Pac had a total of 30, split almost evenly between for-profit and non-profit.

North America, a region covering not much more than the USA and Canada, accounted for 14 approved applications, while Europe accounted for four.

The final stats of the ASP can be found here. The full details of the applicants and their strings will come on Reveal Day in October.

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Comments (3)

  1. Mark Datysgeld says:
    August 28, 2026 at 6:21 pm

    One important question is that it is often more practical to have the base of your Internet-related business closer to potential collaborators and sponsors. That usually means the USA. There are also tax and other structural reasons for choosing one country over another. One of my successful ASP mentees was in the position of needing to make this choice, since its founders are geographically diverse. So there is a second layer involved in eventual analysis of the ASP that goes beyond what country the application ended up being filed under. Speaking entirely informally as an ASP mentor, I’d say I was positively surprised by the number of people from the Global South who at least inquired about the program.

    Reply
  2. Lucas Silva says:
    September 4, 2026 at 6:28 pm

    One of the ASP approved applicants here: two co-founders, two continents (US and Brazil). We incorporated in the US for the reasons Mark describes: legal certainty, a recognised nonprofit form (501(c)(3)), and access to a philanthropic funding ecosystem that is larger and easier to reach than what’s available to us from Latin America.

    The ASP’s figures record where the paperwork was filed, not where a team is from, or who it intends to serve. For us, both answers are global: .self is intentionally focused on individuals, wherever they are.

    Reply
  3. Phil, TLD Advice says:
    September 9, 2026 at 6:18 pm

    As as member of SPIRT, I can confirm that the ICANN Board has approved (only)a 75% reduction on an ASP’ Application Fee – for all of the 56 fully qualified applicants.
    I can also confirm that ICANN has refused to give extra time for ASP Qualified applicants to pay the remaining balance of $54750.
    If the balance was not paid by the deadline(7 days from invoice date in August)the application will fail and will be withdrawn before Reveal Day.

    Reply

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