coindesk.com
Web3 domain firm Unstoppable Domains and five brand partners dropped plans to seek standard internet recognition for 14 extensions, including .crypto, .wallet, .bitcoin and .brave.
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) charges $227,000 to evaluate each new generic top-level domain application, meaning the nine planned bids would have carried more than $2 million in base fees.
The pullback contrasts with heavy spending elsewhere in the first application round since 2012. ICANN received more than 1,600 primary applications, while Link Freedom Group said it invested tens of millions of dollars in more than 300 proposed extensions, including .btc, .nft, .kek and .omg.
Unstoppable CEO Matthew Gould said the 2021 crypto and NFT bubble left people with an inflated view of demand for the web3 market. “It is small. It is niche,” he said.
The company said ICANN integration would also have required more than 4 million existing web3 names to be registered and paid for in the traditional Domain Name System, while requiring owners to disclose registration data.
The company confirmed that .polygon, .nft, .dao, .unstoppable, .zil and .blockchain would also not proceed. Five partner extensions including.privacy, .brave, .anime, .agent and .twin were also dropped after their brand partners chose to remain web3-only, taking the total not proceeding to 14.
The .brave domain is notable because it already resolves natively in the Brave browser, even without recognition through ICANN’s global DNS.
The retreat has unfolded in stages. Unstoppable ran three earlier refund windows tied to abandoned ICANN plans in September 2025, December 2025 and February–March 2026. By March, Gould said traditional DNS domains accounted for more than 90% of the company’s business and that web3-only names had failed to reach mainstream use.
The reversal drew criticism from holders who said the prospect of conventional internet support had influenced their purchases and decisions to keep the names.
Unstoppable said in February that it had “confirmed” its intent to apply for six of the extensions and urged customers to secure names ahead of their potential expansion into the broader internet.
One holder said they rejected offers because of those plans, while another who said they spent thousands of dollars questioned when the company decided not to apply.
Customers who bought eight of the affected extensions on or after March 5, 2025, can request refunds, as can buyers of .blockchain names purchased since June 5, 2024, the company said. Requests close Sept. 25 and will be processed within 28 days.