Taken .com names are not spread evenly across lengths. On 9 October 2026, 99.6% of three-character names were in the zone. So were 62.4% of four-character names, 6.7% of five-character names and 0.3% of six-character names. The shorter the name, the fuller the space.
How many taken .com names are there at each length?
To answer, we compare two numbers for each length. The first is how many names of that length are in the zone file. The second is how many names of that length could exist. Dividing the first by the second gives the share that is already taken.
Here is the result for 9 October 2026. A possible name uses the letters a to z, the digits 0 to 9, and a hyphen anywhere except the first and last place.
| Length | In the zone | Possible names | Share taken |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 characters | 1,289 | 1,296 | 99.5% |
| 3 characters | 47,781 | 47,952 | 99.6% |
| 4 characters | 1,107,020 | 1,774,224 | 62.4% |
| 5 characters | 4,368,923 | 65,646,288 | 6.7% |
| 6 characters | 8,425,711 | about 2.4 billion | 0.3% |
| 7 characters | 9,814,242 | about 89.9 billion | 0.011% |
Why counts alone mislead
Our chart of name lengths shows a peak at 11 characters. That peak does not mean 11 is the best length. It means that people registered many names there. At 11 characters, the pool of possible names is huge, so even a small share fills a lot of rows.
For this reason a count hides the pattern. A fill rate shows it. Two and three characters are nearly full, and the rate falls off a cliff after four. The average length post shows the counts, and this post shows how full each length is.
Why short taken .com names are nearly all gone
Short names went first, because everyone wanted them. Of the 1,296 possible two-character names, 1,289 are in the zone. The other seven are not free either. We looked each one up in the registry, and every one has an owner. They just have no nameservers, so the zone does not list them.
Three characters tell the same story. Only 171 of the 47,952 possible names are missing from the zone, and some of those may be registered without nameservers, like the two-character ones. In practice, no short .com name is waiting for you. Our short names post shows where five and six letters still offer room.
What the low rate at five and six characters means
At five characters, 6.7% of the space is taken. At six, it is 0.3%. That sounds like a lot of room, and in a sense it is. However, most of the possible names are random strings such as "xq7vk". Nobody can say them, spell them or remember them.
So the useful question is not how many names are free. It is how many free names are good. The zone cannot answer that. A tool can only rank the free names by how readable they are. The Short Domains tool does this for three to six letters, and the Domain Name Generator does it for your own keyword.
What this table cannot tell you
The zone lists names that have nameservers. A name that is registered but has none is missing, so each rate is a lower bound. Also, the zone does not say who owns a name, or whether the owner will sell. Our numbers come from the zone file that ICANN's Centralized Zone Data Service gives to approved users.
A name that is not in the zone is not proof that you can register it. Check it live before you plan around it. The Availability Checker asks the registry for you.
How to use the fill rate
Once you know the numbers, three rules follow:
- Do not hunt for a free name of two, three or four letters. The odds are close to zero.
- Start with five or six letters only if the name is easy to say aloud.
- Otherwise, join two real words, which gives you a longer name with a far better chance of being free.
Our State of .com page updates the zone totals every day, so you can see how the space changes over time.
Originally published at namedaemon.com/taken-com-names-by-length/. NameDaemon has 18 free tools for .com names, built on the daily zone file, and the numbers are on the State of .com page.
