1. Openprovider
  2. Domains
  3. Documentation per TLD

.fr

This article describes the procedures and requirements of .fr domain names.
Click on the subject below to open the dropdown for more information.

Registration

Successful domain registration requires:

  • Registrant contact require:
    • Located within the EU, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland or any of the French overseas territories.
    • For private individual
      • the date, place and country of birth (hidden in whois)
  • Technical contact must be a company
  • two or more nameservers or a nameserver group

 

The registry will preform checks on the requirements above and contact the registrant directly in case the requirements are not met to ask for proof of identification data. (For example, the registrant seems to have an address outside the EU).
Proof of identification data contains:

  • Company
    - business registration certificate 
    - the ID of the legal representative of the company
  • Private individual
    - copy of the holder's national identity card or passport
    - proof of residence of less than three months (telephone or electricity bill, tax notice, etc.
    - holder's email address and telephone number

    Registry maintains a list of domain names to the "reserved" status (towns, community names). If registration fails with a "2304, Object status prohibits operation" error, contact us in such case (reserved domain names can be registered if the registrant has a legitimate interest).

Domain names under the extensions .com.fr, .asso.fr and .tm.fr are discontinued since 2013. No new domain names can be registered under those extensions. Existing domains under those extensions can be managed like any other domain and can be transferred into Openprovider.

Registrants from the United Kingdom that registered their domain before the 1st of January 2021 are eligible to keep their domain name; they can update, transfer and renew their domain name as any other registrant. However, as the Brexit transition period ended, new registrations for registrants from the United Kingdom are not allowed anymore.

Transfer

Successful domain transfer via RCP or API requires:

  • Registrant contact require:
    • Located within the EU, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland or any of the French overseas territories.
    • For private individual
      • the date, place and country of birth (hidden in whois)
  • Technical contact must be a company
  • two or more nameservers or a nameserver group

 

The transfer period is subject to cooperation of the current registrar:

  • if the current registrar approves the transfer, it completes immediately
  • if the current registrar does not approve/reject the transfer, it completes after 8 days
  • if the current registrar rejects the transfer within the first 8 days, it completes after 22 days

If the holder wants to cancel an initiated transfer, only the gaining registrar (Openprovider) can do so; you can cancel the transfer from the transfer queue in RCP.

The registry will not send an e-mail to the domain contacts after the transfer finishes.

Authorization code required yes
Method of confirmation authcode
Registration period after transfer restarts
Average transfer time 8-22 days
Advanced and simple transfers available Contact our Sales department to check if easy transfer of 100 or more .fr domains is available.
Update

Owner change (trade)

  • requested as a normal domain update via RCP or API
  • processed realtime

If your domain is premium/reserved - contact us to validate this change.

Other update

  • requested via RCP or API
  • processed realtime
Deletion / Restore

Delete

  • requested via RCP or API
  • processed realtime
  • will result in a quarantine period

 

Restore / reactivate

  • restore / reactivation supported via RCP or API
  • quarantine period can be found under
    Detailed extension information > Technical information > Quarantine period

 

Detailed extension information
Registry
Technical information
  • Available second level domains: .nom.fr, .prd.fr, .presse.fr
  • DNSSEC support: yes
  • Minimum length: 1 characters
  • Maximum length: 63 characters
  • Allowed characters: a-z 0-9 -
  • IDN characters: supported
  • Registration period: 1 year
  • Renewal date offset: 2 days
    The number of days before the registry's expiration date, that Openprovider requires the domain to be renewed or expired. More info.
    Note that the dates as shown in your Openprovider account are always leading, even if they do not match the renewal date offset mentioned here.
  • Soft quarantine period: n/a days
    During this period, following after an expiration, the domain can be restored for free. This period does not apply if the domain is deleted explicitly. More info.
  • Quarantine period: 29 days
    During this period, an expired or deleted domain name can be reactivated at an additional fee.
Restrictions
  • Local presence required? yes
  • Does Openprovider provide local presence services? yes
  • Local activity required? no
  • Correct nameserver configuration required? no
  • It is required that the office/residence of the registrant is within the EU, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland or any of the French overseas territories.
  • A .fr domain name may not end in "-gouv.fr"
  • Additional information about date, place and country of birth (private individuals) is required.
  • The tech handle can not be a person, but needs to be a company handle
Policies
Registration agreement The registry requires that a registration agreement is in place between the provider and the domain holder. The text of this registration agreement and any required supplements is the following:

Due to the regular changes in registry rules and configuration or missing information from registry side, and despite our effort to keep our knowledge base up-to-date, information in the knowledge base may be outdated or incorrect. If you encounter some issue, please report it through the "HotJar" feedback collector on the bottom right, or (if it is blocked by your browser) by clicking the "Submit a request" link below. No rights can be derived from the information in this knowledge base. If there is discrepancy between the knowledge base and the process in Openprovider, the process in Openprovider is leading.

Was this article helpful?
5 out of 5 found this helpful
Additional questions? Submit a request