Everyone in the expired domain trade repeats the same warning. Good names are gone within seconds of the drop, so you need a backorder.
We checked. This post is what we found.
The short version. About one in five good dropped domains is taken within a day. After that the share hardly moves.
Strong names are a different market. Two thirds of them are gone within a day, and one in six is still free a month later.
How we checked
A domain "drops" when its registry deletes it. From that moment anyone can register it again.
DomCop lists these names before they drop, with their metrics. After the drop, we keep checking whether each name is still free.
We check every dropped name with a Moz Domain Authority of 10 or more, or a Majestic Trust Flow of 10 or more. We check at 1, 3, 7, 14 and 28 days after the drop. That is about 45,000 names a day.
The numbers below come from the checks we ran between 7 September and 6 October 2026. About 500,000 names in all.
Share of dropped domains taken again, by days since the drop
| Names | Gone after 1 day | After 1 week | After 4 weeks |
|---|---|---|---|
| All with DA 10+ or TF 10+ | 19% | 25% | 20% |
| DA 10 to 19 | 39% | 41% | 32% |
| DA 20 to 29 | 60% | 70% | 82% |
| DA 30 to 39 | 69% | 83% | 86% |
| TF 20 to 29 | 46% | 56% | 71% |
| TF 30 or more | 67% | 75% | 91% |
| Strong: DA 20+ and TF 10+ | 66% | 75% | 83% |
| .com with DA 10+ or TF 10+ | 16% | 17% | 16% |
| Strong .com names | 64% | 65% | 76% |
What the numbers say
For most names, drop day is the only day that matters
Across all good dropped names, 19% are taken within a day. After four weeks the share is about 20%.
The 25% in the one-week column comes from a different group of names, not from a rise.
In plain words: the names that drop catchers want, they take on drop day. The other four in five sit there for a month, and nobody takes them.
For .com it is flatter still. 16% after a day, 16% after four weeks.
Stronger names go faster
Move up the metric bands and the drop-day share climbs. 39% of DA 10 to 19 names are gone within a day. For DA 20 to 29 it is 60%, and for DA 30 to 39 it is 69%.
The strong names (DA 20 or more and TF 10 or more) are 66% gone within a day, 75% within a week and 83% within four weeks.
Trust Flow is the sharper signal. 67% of TF 30+ names are gone within a day, and 91% within a month.
One in six strong names is still free a month later
This is the number that surprised us. 17% of the strong names were still free four weeks after the drop.
They had the metrics. They were on the public drop lists. Nobody registered them.
Some have odd spellings or sit in extensions few people buy. But mostly there are more good drops each day than there are buyers watching. At 45,000 good drops a day, nobody sees them all.
After drop day, the market slows to a crawl
For the strong names, the share taken goes from 66% after a day to 75% after a week. That is 9 points in six days, a seventh of what the first day took.
From a week to a month it adds another 8 points.
If you do not run a drop-catching service, your hunting ground is day 2 to day 30. A third of the strong names are still free there, and there is little competition.
What to do with this
- Backorder the names you cannot live without. A strong name has a one-in-three chance of still being free the morning after the drop. A backorder at DropCatch, NameJet or SnapNames is how the other two thirds are taken. Our guide to domain backorders explains how the services differ.
- Hunt the day after, not the minute of. A list of yesterday's drops, with DA, TF and linking domains on every row, is where that one in three sits at registration price. That is what the expired list in DomCop is for.
- Do not assume a free name is a bad name. Sometimes a strong name is passed over for a reason: a spam history, a trademark, a poor extension. Often the reason is only that nobody looked. Run the domain age and history check before you register.
- Weight Trust Flow over Domain Authority when you decide what to backorder. The fastest buyers move on TF.
Method and caveats
- Which names. Domains on DomCop's drop lists that dropped between 7 September and 6 October 2026. Each had a Moz DA of 10 or more, or a Majestic TF of 10 or more, when listed. About 500,000 names.
- What "taken" means. The name resolved in DNS, or a registrar reported it as registered, at the time of the check. A name parked by a drop catcher counts as taken. Some country-code registries hold a name for a few days after deleting it, which can make it look taken. These are a small share of the set.
- Different names in each column. We did not follow the same names over time. Each column is a separate group of names checked at that age. That is why a few rows do not rise in a straight line. Group sizes: 44,000 names at one day, 49,000 at three days, 72,000 at a week, 263,000 at two weeks and 69,000 at four weeks.
- Auction names are left out. Names sold at GoDaddy, NameJet, Dynadot and the rest show as taken 93% to 100% of the time at every age. The buyer or the old owner holds them, so they say nothing about drops.
- Our interest. DomCop is a paid tool for finding expired domains. The method is written down so the numbers can be checked. Corrections sent to support are welcome and will be noted here.
We will repeat this each quarter. The next edition adds how fast the taken names come back to market as auctions.
