If you have been around the internet long enough, you remember the allure of Freenom. It felt like a cheat code for the web: free top-level domains (TLDs) ending in .tk, .ml, .ga, .cf, and .gq. For broke students, hobbyist developers, and people just testing the waters, it was a dream come true.

But in 2024 and 2025, that dream turned into a digital nightmare.

Freenom has not just “gone downhill”; it has crashed, burned, and taken millions of websites down with it. The company effectively imploded under the weight of lawsuits, negligence, and shady business practices. If you are still relying on Freenom, or considering them for a new project, stop immediately.

Here is the cautionary tale of how the internet’s favorite freebie became its biggest liability.

The “Free” Business Model: You Were Never the Customer

To understand why Freenom failed, you have to understand how they operated.

Freenom managed the Country Code Top-Level Domains (ccTLDs) for five small nations: Tokelau (.tk), Mali (.ml), Gabon (.ga), Central African Republic (.cf), and Equatorial Guinea (.gq). They offered these domains for free to the public.

But servers cost money. Staff costs money. So, how did they survive?

1. Ad Monetization: If your free domain expired or was cancelled, they would monetize the traffic hitting that URL.

2. The “Traffic Steal”: This is the most insidious part. Freenom’s terms of service allowed them to “cancel” a free domain at any time without warning. Users reported for years that as soon as their free site started getting significant traffic (and becoming valuable), Freenom would reclaim the domain and fill it with ads, effectively hijacking the user’s hard work.

You didn’t own the domain. You were just borrowing it until it was valuable enough for them to take back.

The Collapse: Lawsuits and Accreditation Loss

The cracks in Freenom’s hull turned into gaping holes in 2023, leading to a total collapse by 2024.

1. The Meta Lawsuit

In March 2023, Meta (Facebook) sued Freenom for cybersquatting. Meta alleged that Freenom was ignoring abuse complaints and allowing bad actors to register domains like faceb00k.tk or whats-app.cf to phish users.

• The Result: Freenom settled the lawsuit, but the damage was done. They halted new domain registrations to “address technical issues”—a pause that became permanent.

2. Losing ICANN Accreditation

If the lawsuit was a punch to the gut, ICANN (the organization that manages the global domain system) delivered the knockout blow. In late 2023, ICANN terminated Freenom’s accreditation as a registrar.

• The Impact: Freenom was officially locked out of the legitimate domain industry. They could no longer sell or manage generic top-level domains (like .com or .net).

3. The Contract Terminations

Following the chaos, the nations that entrusted their domains to Freenom realized the partnership was toxic. One by one, countries like Gabon and Mali terminated their contracts, forcibly reclaiming their national TLDs. Millions of .ml and .ga sites went offline overnight as the technical infrastructure was ripped away from Freenom.

The User Experience: A Masterclass in Frustration

If you try to use Freenom today, you aren’t just met with a bad service; you are met with a broken one.

• The “Pending” Purgatory: Users who tried to renew domains in the last year often found their status stuck in “Pending” forever. The domains eventually expired, and the websites vanished.

• The Login Loop: Many users reported being locked out of their control panels entirely, unable to even change their DNS records to move their site elsewhere.

• Support Ghosting: Freenom’s support ticket system became a black hole. Tickets went unanswered for months, then years. Today, there is effectively no one manning the ship.

• DNS Resolution Failure: As the infrastructure crumbled, Freenom’s DNS servers became unreliable. Sites would flicker on and off, or simply return NXDOMAIN (domain not found) errors globally.

A Cautionary Tale: Why You Must Avoid “Free”

The Freenom saga teaches us a painful lesson about digital sovereignty: If you are not paying for the product, you have no rights to it.

Imagine building a portfolio, a small business, or a community on a .tk domain. You spend years building SEO, printing business cards, and sharing the link. Then, one Tuesday morning, the domain is gone. No email warning. No grace period. No support number to call.

That is the reality for millions of Freenom users.

The Alternatives

Do not risk your online presence to save $10 a year. Real domain registrars offer security, legal ownership, and actual support.

• Porkbun / Namecheap / Cloudflare: These registrars are transparent, affordable (often selling .com or .org for $9-$12/year), and they won’t steal your domain just because it gets popular.

• GitHub Pages / Netlify: If you need a free option for a hobby project, use the subdomains provided by these platforms (e.g., yourproject.netlify.app). They are stable, reputable, and free.

The Warning

Do not attempt to register a domain with Freenom.

If you still have a working domain with them, transfer it immediately if you can, or prepare to migrate to a new domain right now. Freenom is a sinking ship that has already gone under; don’t let your digital life drown with it.

Status Update: As of early 2026, the Freenom website remains a shell. New registrations are disabled, and legacy domains are rapidly expiring or being revoked. Avoid at all costs.