Carlow saw a higher number of new .ie domain names registered last year than Kilkenny.
1,285 are listed for Carlow, marking a 48% increase on 2019.
Kilkenny’s rise was 19%, with 953.
65,113 were lodged in total for Ireland across 2020, the highest figure ever, with 39,722 of them across Leinster.
It’s as businesses, services and community groups mobilised online in response to the pandemic.
The pandemic’s influence on the online identities chosen in 2020 is evident in the words used in new .ie domain web addresses.
“Health” and “Covid” were the second and fourth most common keywords respectively.
315 .ie domains containing the word “mask” or “facemask” were registered in 2020 compared to just 6 in 2019; 61 containing the word “remote” (e.g. remote work) were registered in 2020 compared to 5 in 2019.
General health-related keywords, including “wellness”, “supplement”, “pharmacy”, and “fitness”, increased 92% year-on-year.
178 .ie web addresses containing the words “mental health” or “counselling” were registered in 2020, up from 87 in 2019 (+105%). 89 .ie domains containing the words “doctor” or “nurse” were registered vs 62 in 2019 (+44%).