So, further to recent changes at Gandi, I've just got some more info from support which I've included below. I've purchased domains from Gandi, pre-paying for multiple years of service such that some domains I have don't need renewing until 2027. When I purchased that service the offer was inclusive of 2 mailboxes for the duration of the contract, and now they're planning to remove those inclusive mailboxes and start charging me extra for them from next month.
To me, this sounds like a planned and fully intentional breach of contract.
"We'll start charging for mailboxes from next month.
Our current mail offer will end and will be replaced by our new offer: [...]
What’s going to happen going forward ?
Starting from April 6th, you will have the choice to either :
- Keep your mailbox and pay accordingly on a monthly basis.
- Refuse the offer and you can have the choice to delete the mailbox or migrate
your mailbox to another provider. In that case you will have a two months
window to migrate before the deletion of your mailbox
- Forwarding address remains free
How ?
- You will receive ln the 6th of April a mail with a link to make your choice.
How much it will cost for me ?
- It will depend on how many active mailboxes you own. A mailbox costs £2,99 so
if you have 2 mailboxes, you will be billed £5,98 monthly."
As some comments have mentioned the pricing will increase for domain names too, not very explicit in their email on Tuesday evening "Gandi.net - Update":
Domains
We remain committed to offering you the largest portfolio of TLDs,
customized TLD suggestions and best-in-class anycast-level primary
DNS servers. In addition, we will step-up our effort to unburden you
by introducing new managed features:
Advanced and easy to use account security
Proactive notifications on changes and important events
Better rights management
Easier domain transfers with continuity of service
Best-in-class anycast-level secondary DNS servers
You can find the associated new pricing for your domains here[0].
Renewing a .com at these new prices is now £24 per year inclusive of tax and .uk domains £12.
Annoyingly my previous registrar raised prices last year and I thought that, hey, I'll pay a few quid extra and support Gandi as they generally have a decent reputation. Now with this move I'm the fool!
Like others in this thread I've moved to Porkbun, the .com renewals are now about £8.50 and .uk about £5.50 which is much more reasonable and much closer to their cost price.
I'd like my registrar to make a reasonable amount of profit to make staying in business worthwhile but that doesn't make sense when the registrar wants to double or triple the pricing for their bottom line.
Gandi was always a premium provider at premium prices. But I was pitched them, years ago, by someone who knew someone at the company that they were worth the extra price... because there would be no BS. No hidden pricing, no sniping of domains based on searching for them, all that. Everything in this thread, frankly, is a breach of that trust.
> I'd like my registrar to make a reasonable amount of profit to make staying in business worthwhile
Ditto. Moved 11 domains from Gandi to Porkbun today. But... for the lot of them, Porkbun was only $9 more than Cloudflare, which charges straight wholesale prices and takes no profit.
I'm glad Porkbun isn't gouging, but less than $1/domain/year markup still feels a bit thin and leaves me worried that I'll be doing this dance again in a few years.
Based on advice here I just tried Porkbun. A not-quite-professional website that prefers making jokes to fixing layout bugs, I try to sign up and the symbols in my password cause it to fail with a 403 (!!). I'm super scared about their technical abilities and general security. Are we going to see another Gandi 6 mo down the line?
Domains are the keys to the internet atm, it would be nice to see someone take it seriously.
Edit: I guess I'll try realtimeregister, since I haven't seen anything negative and they support U2F per Yubikey's catalog.
Edit2: Cool, cool, when you sign up they assign you a non-random password which anyone can use to log in and view your personal information.
Edit3: Others with u2f support that aren't MAMAA: Cloudflare (close), OVH, DNSimple (accounts are $60/year)
I've been using Porkbun for years and it's been great. Good prices, reliability, security, and they don't push nonsense add-on services on you like a lot of other domain providers.
I moved some domains from Gandi to Porkbun before as part of a plan to ditch Gandi and when I asked (almost 3 years ago to the day), they didn't support .uk.
> I've purchased domains from Gandi, pre-paying for multiple years of service such that some domains I have don't need renewing until 2027.
Just in case you did not know: if you transfer to a different registrar, you will not lose the extra years of registration. You can confirm the expected expiration date of 2027 at lookup.icann.org.
It sound like they’re hosting at the same place (gandi) where they registered the domain. This is absolutely never recommended, for security purposes. If someone gains access to your hosting account you’ll likely lose all your domain names.
Transfer the domains over to a better more secure registrar. Then set up a server or vps and set up as many mailboxes or emails that you need.
Gandi email has been useless from the start. They say right in the contract that they don't back up their email servers. Isn't the host handling chores like backup part of the point of a hosted product? Of course you can and should distrust the host's backups and have your own in addition, but that's way different than the host not doing them in the first place.
Maybe they have fixed that (I don't see it on their site any more) but I have a screen shot of the old contract provision and I complained to them about it in 2017, and they ignored the complaint.
This is really frustrating. I'm only a small customer but it doesn't seem right that they could take away part of the deal if I have multiple years pre-bought prior to the change.
The email I received is slightly different and doesn't include set dates, it just says "after the first year" which could be tomorrow.
I've emailed them asking for clarification.
I pay for Fastmail, but use several of the gandi basic mailboxes for other reasons. I could live with those disappearing. I hope this doesn't also remove the 'forwarded addresses' though.
The submitted title was "Domain registrar Gandi gets bought out, screws existing customers". The latter bit is linkbait so I've edited it (as the site guidelines request - https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html). But I realize the OP isn't just complaining about price increases, so if someone can suggest a more accurate and neutral title, we can change it again.
I have been a Gandi customer for 5+ years, and I have bought domains til 2026, and I rely on their free email. But I haven't received any communication about changes in pricing.
I honestly cannot believe the hubris. A 20% price hike and removal of features mid-term. If I don't pay for the email accounts I apparently didn't pay for, I will lose my business email accounts. I get the impression I should just have stuck with : <official sounding>_<country> @ gmail.com and moved on with my life. Maddening.
I have quite a few domains with Gandi, using their email service on a few because I'm lazy and it's free. Not sure when (or if) I'll receive notice of this change. Maybe it's regional? Seems most of the comments show £ as currency.
This is going to burn all of their goodwill they accumulated with the "no bullshit" slogan. I will be swiftly moving all my domains, likely to Porkbun.
I'd be a lot happier as a long-time GANDI customer if there was any mention of this whatsoever on https://news.gandi.net ... nothing there since 2022. :-(
I didn't get an email, there's no news, and AFAICT this story hasn't been picked up by any other news outlets at all (nothing on Google News at least). There are a couple individual anecdotes, and off topic discussions about domain prices.
Gandi obviously has issues, but is the thing about email real? Are there _any_ sources that can confirm it?
I generally open up https://tld-list.com/ (which lists most registrars for any given TLD, along with the prices). I then choose the cheapest non-shady looking one. Porkbun, NameSilo, and Epik are fine options usually.
ycombinator.com itself is on 81 "Gandi SAS", although they use AWS DNS, so chances are it's through Route53 (since AWS isn't an ICANN registrar, they have other registrars actually handle the registry ops)
DNSimple is excellent. I don't recommend using Route53, while their GUI and features are good they charge per DNS query. I had someone trying exploit that and ended up with a 100x higher bill than normal in one month. It is impossible to do anything about it except purchase AWS Shield Advanced which costs $3000 per month.
I love EasyDNS - not the cheapest, but the service is EXCELLENT. Over 10 years or so, I've had to call support a couple of times to setup new features, and not only do they answer the phone - but you get a real engineer!
It costs me about $40/year for domain (.org), dns, backup MX/mail spool, and a couple of other bits and pieces. It's been well worth it for the piece of mind.
I've only got just one, but I'm pretty happy with Google. I mean, I know it's Google so there's always the worry they'll get bored with the product, but it works fine and has integration with my Asus router so I can dynDNS my home for my kids' minecraft server.
I’ve been using https://hover.com (domains only) for over a decade and have had zero issues. They never bother me and only email for things I’d want to be notified (e.g. domain expiring).
[+] [-] varun_chopra|3 years ago|reply
So, further to recent changes at Gandi, I've just got some more info from support which I've included below. I've purchased domains from Gandi, pre-paying for multiple years of service such that some domains I have don't need renewing until 2027. When I purchased that service the offer was inclusive of 2 mailboxes for the duration of the contract, and now they're planning to remove those inclusive mailboxes and start charging me extra for them from next month.
To me, this sounds like a planned and fully intentional breach of contract.
"We'll start charging for mailboxes from next month. Our current mail offer will end and will be replaced by our new offer: [...]
What’s going to happen going forward ?
Starting from April 6th, you will have the choice to either : - Keep your mailbox and pay accordingly on a monthly basis. - Refuse the offer and you can have the choice to delete the mailbox or migrate your mailbox to another provider. In that case you will have a two months window to migrate before the deletion of your mailbox - Forwarding address remains free
How ? - You will receive ln the 6th of April a mail with a link to make your choice.
How much it will cost for me ? - It will depend on how many active mailboxes you own. A mailbox costs £2,99 so if you have 2 mailboxes, you will be billed £5,98 monthly."
[+] [-] motrm|3 years ago|reply
Annoyingly my previous registrar raised prices last year and I thought that, hey, I'll pay a few quid extra and support Gandi as they generally have a decent reputation. Now with this move I'm the fool!
Like others in this thread I've moved to Porkbun, the .com renewals are now about £8.50 and .uk about £5.50 which is much more reasonable and much closer to their cost price.
I'd like my registrar to make a reasonable amount of profit to make staying in business worthwhile but that doesn't make sense when the registrar wants to double or triple the pricing for their bottom line.
Shame, but there we go.
[0] https://www.gandi.net/static/documents/2023-march-gbp-renew-...
[+] [-] btown|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] callahad|3 years ago|reply
Ditto. Moved 11 domains from Gandi to Porkbun today. But... for the lot of them, Porkbun was only $9 more than Cloudflare, which charges straight wholesale prices and takes no profit.
I'm glad Porkbun isn't gouging, but less than $1/domain/year markup still feels a bit thin and leaves me worried that I'll be doing this dance again in a few years.
[+] [-] rendaw|3 years ago|reply
Domains are the keys to the internet atm, it would be nice to see someone take it seriously.
Edit: I guess I'll try realtimeregister, since I haven't seen anything negative and they support U2F per Yubikey's catalog.
Edit2: Cool, cool, when you sign up they assign you a non-random password which anyone can use to log in and view your personal information.
Edit3: Others with u2f support that aren't MAMAA: Cloudflare (close), OVH, DNSimple (accounts are $60/year)
[+] [-] imilk|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tolien|3 years ago|reply
Porkbun do .uk domains now? TIL!
I moved some domains from Gandi to Porkbun before as part of a plan to ditch Gandi and when I asked (almost 3 years ago to the day), they didn't support .uk.
[+] [-] mikea1|3 years ago|reply
Just in case you did not know: if you transfer to a different registrar, you will not lose the extra years of registration. You can confirm the expected expiration date of 2027 at lookup.icann.org.
[+] [-] kikoreis|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sam_lowry_|3 years ago|reply
If she did not sue Valentin Lacambre, he would not have abandoned altern.org.
If he kept altern.org, gandi would have been an association, not a corporation.
And the world would be a slightly better place.
[+] [-] bhartzer|3 years ago|reply
Transfer the domains over to a better more secure registrar. Then set up a server or vps and set up as many mailboxes or emails that you need.
[+] [-] throwaway81523|3 years ago|reply
Maybe they have fixed that (I don't see it on their site any more) but I have a screen shot of the old contract provision and I complained to them about it in 2017, and they ignored the complaint.
[+] [-] pricechild|3 years ago|reply
The email I received is slightly different and doesn't include set dates, it just says "after the first year" which could be tomorrow.
I've emailed them asking for clarification.
I pay for Fastmail, but use several of the gandi basic mailboxes for other reasons. I could live with those disappearing. I hope this doesn't also remove the 'forwarded addresses' though.
[+] [-] WirelessGigabit|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] conradfr|3 years ago|reply
That may be a new record.
[+] [-] dang|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] deanmoriarty|3 years ago|reply
I have been a Gandi customer for 5+ years, and I have bought domains til 2026, and I rely on their free email. But I haven't received any communication about changes in pricing.
[+] [-] marksbrown|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TheChaplain|3 years ago|reply
I managed to grab a screenshot earlier: https://imgur.com/a/JB4xpPs
[+] [-] mtlynch|3 years ago|reply
Is it true?
[+] [-] mcsniff|3 years ago|reply
This is going to burn all of their goodwill they accumulated with the "no bullshit" slogan. I will be swiftly moving all my domains, likely to Porkbun.
[+] [-] swayvil|3 years ago|reply
I've been using Gandi for over a decade.
[+] [-] branon|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Thoreandan|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rendaw|3 years ago|reply
Gandi obviously has issues, but is the thing about email real? Are there _any_ sources that can confirm it?
[+] [-] glandium|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bob1029|3 years ago|reply
I've been super lazy and use Route53 for everything right now.
[+] [-] notpushkin|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] necessary|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] judge2020|3 years ago|reply
ycombinator.com itself is on 81 "Gandi SAS", although they use AWS DNS, so chances are it's through Route53 (since AWS isn't an ICANN registrar, they have other registrars actually handle the registry ops)
[+] [-] Jayschwa|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] csunbird|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] metafunctor|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sfeng|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] danwee|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] basilgohar|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sleepyhead|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] daneel_w|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mech422|3 years ago|reply
It costs me about $40/year for domain (.org), dns, backup MX/mail spool, and a couple of other bits and pieces. It's been well worth it for the piece of mind.
[+] [-] nubinetwork|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] changethe|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] manuelmoreale|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 95014_refugee|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Pxtl|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] latexr|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rationalist|3 years ago|reply
They are just as cheap as the often-mentioned NameCheap, but a much better UI.
Dynadot also lets you "domain taste" that is get a refund in credit if you change your mind after buying a domain within I think 72 hours.
They also are one of the largest domain registrars.
[+] [-] Faaak|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Macha|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jacooper|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] asddubs|3 years ago|reply