New .qa Domain Rules from 22 October 2026: A Checklist for Egyptian Companies and Agencies Before Touching a Qatari Domain
Short answer: Since 22 October 2026, second-level .qa domains are no longer open to anyone in the world. Every new registration goes through an eligibility check (a Qatari commercial registration or trade licence, a trademark, a Qatar ID or residency, or another official category). Existing domains are not cancelled automatically, but any change to them, including a nameserver change, triggers the same check. If the registrant does not qualify, the domain is deleted and enters a 30-day redemption period during which the website and email stop working. Any Egyptian company or agency that manages a Qatari domain should review its eligibility file before moving hosting or editing the domain's registration.
The new .qa domain rules are a set of policies from Qatar's Communications Regulatory Authority (CRA), which operates the Qatar Domains Registry. They took effect when the registry moved to a new platform at midnight Qatar time on Thursday, 22 October 2026. They matter to the Egyptian market directly: many Egyptian companies work in Qatar, and many Egyptian software, marketing and hosting agencies run websites and email for Gulf clients on .qa domains. This article explains exactly what changed, shares a measurement we ran ourselves on the most visited Qatari domains, and gives a practical Smart One Group checklist to follow before you touch any setting on a Qatari domain.
What changed under the new .qa domain rules?
Until 21 October 2026, any person or company anywhere could register a name like example.qa without documents. Now, section 5.17 of the CRA's Domain Name Registration, Expiry, Renewal and Deletion Policy (version 3.0) requires every .qa applicant to fall into one of these categories and meet its requirements:
- Commercial entities, under the com.qa requirements in section 5.18.
- Information and communication technology (ICT) companies and service providers.
- Natural persons who are citizens or residents of the State of Qatar.
- Not-for-profit organisations.
- Schools and higher education institutions.
- Government departments, ministries, supreme councils and military authorities of the State of Qatar.
Section 5.18 requires com.qa applicants to hold a valid trade licence or commercial registration issued within Qatar, or to be the registered holder of a trademark in the State of Qatar. They must also submit a valid official document from a competent authority within the State showing their legal status or entitlement to the name. The same rules apply to the Arabic-script .قطر domain under section 5.25.
One clause stands out, section 5.17.5: a .qa registrant may not sell, rent or lease the domain to another party. That alone is reason to review any arrangement where an agency registers a domain in its own name and "provides" it to a client as part of a subscription.
What about domains registered before 22 October?
According to accredited registrar QHost, whose page was updated on 21 October 2026 after a CRA clarification, existing domains keep auto-renewing on the new platform and are not cancelled automatically, but they are not permanently exempt. Eligibility verification must be completed before modifications are processed. Changes that may trigger it include:
- Changes to registrant information.
- Updates to registered contact details.
- Nameserver modifications.
- Applicable DNS updates and other changes to registration information.
If the registrant does not qualify when verification is required, the registrar must delete the domain and it enters the redemption period. The official policy (section 5.29.5) says a domain in redemption is removed from the zone file, which suspends any associated website or email. Once purged, the name becomes available to any eligible registrant (section 5.31.6), so a former owner who does not qualify cannot simply register it again.
Table: the key new rules and their practical impact
| Item | New rule | Practical impact for your company |
|---|---|---|
| New .qa registration | Document-based eligibility check before approval | An available name is not an approved name, and payment is not instant activation |
| Add grace period | 5 days instead of 3 | The registrar can delete an ineligible application within it |
| Renewal grace period | 5 days instead of 3 | Slightly more time to correct a renewal |
| Auto-renewal | One year, with a 45-day auto-renew grace period | The registrar may delete the domain during it instead of renewing |
| Inter-registrar transfer | 5-day processing window instead of 2, plus a mandatory one-year renewal with every transfer | Plan transfers early and budget for an extra year |
| Transfer lock | 60 days after registration or transfer | Do not transfer a domain right after registering it |
| Redemption | 30 days, then one day in pending delete | Website and email stop during this period |
| Selling or renting the domain | Prohibited by section 5.17.5 | Register the domain in the client's name, not the agency's |
Table sources: the CRA registration and transfer policies, with QHost's page for the previous values.
Smart One Group measurement: three in four top .qa domains use external nameservers
Why focus on nameservers? Because moving a website to another hosting company, or moving DNS management to a service like Cloudflare, usually means changing the nameservers registered at the registry. That is a registry transaction that triggers eligibility verification. To size the exposure, on 26 October 2026 (09:32 Cairo time) we checked every Qatari domain in the Tranco list of the top one million domains (list 262N9):
- We found 152 Qatari domains across all extensions, 90 of them second-level .qa domains.
- 87 of those 90 returned nameserver records.
- 65 of the 87 (about 75%) rely entirely on nameservers outside .qa, against 22 whose nameservers sit under .qa.
- 44 are run on global DNS providers: Cloudflare (25), Amazon Route 53 (8), Microsoft Azure DNS (3), CSC (3), Google (2), Akamai (2) and NS1 (1).
- 9 use registrar or parking nameservers, and their owners may need to change nameservers when they launch a real website.
The right reading is not that these domains are at risk. It is that changing the DNS or hosting provider of a .qa domain is now a legal decision, not only a technical one. This is a sample of the most visited domains, not a census of all Qatari domains.
Do ordinary DNS record changes trigger verification?
QHost explains that changing A, MX, TXT or CNAME records at an external DNS provider, without changing the registered nameservers, normally involves no EPP transaction at the registry. It also warns that CRA's guidance refers broadly to DNS updates and that the treatment of every external DNS scenario has not been separately specified. Our advice: make hosting moves by editing records at your current DNS provider where possible, and postpone nameserver changes until the eligibility file is ready.
Can an Egyptian company keep a .qa domain or register a new one?
It depends on a legal link to Qatar. An Egyptian company with a branch or commercial registration in Qatar falls under commercial entities. For a company with no Qatari entity, the closest route is a trademark registered in the State of Qatar. A useful fact here: Egypt and Qatar are both members of the Madrid Protocol. It entered into force for Egypt on 3 September 2009 and for Qatar on 3 August 2024, according to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), so the holder of a mark registered in Egypt can seek to extend its protection to Qatar. However, we found no official text confirming that the Qatari registry accepts a Madrid designation in place of a national registration, so confirm with your registrar before relying on it.
Note too that, under the policy, com.qa names are only available through accredited registrars in the State of Qatar. For domain ownership in general, see our article on company domain ownership and ICANN transfer rules, and compare with the Egyptian requirements in our guide to registering a .eg domain in Egypt.
Smart One Group checklist before any change to a .qa domain
- Inventory your Qatari domains: every .qa, com.qa or .قطر domain your company owns or manages for clients, with registrant name, registrar, expiry date and current nameservers.
- Identify the eligibility basis for each domain: a Qatari commercial registration or licence, a trademark registered in Qatar, or a Qatar ID or residency for an individual registrant.
- Freeze nameserver changes until the document file is ready, and move hosting by editing records at the current DNS provider.
- Fix ownership: if the agency is the registrant on behalf of a client, plan to move the registrant role to the eligible client, knowing that this change will itself trigger verification.
- Renew before expiry: do not rely on redemption, because the website and email stop during it.
- Plan registrar transfers: account for the 60-day lock, the five-day processing window and the mandatory one-year renewal.
- Store documents securely: do not send ID copies over unprotected email; ask your registrar for an official submission channel.
If your website runs on a Qatari domain and needs to move to new hosting, or you want your domain ownership reviewed through our domain management service, start with the inventory before any other step.
Frequently asked questions
When did the new .qa domain rules take effect?
They took effect when the Qatari registry moved to its new platform on 22 October 2026 at 12:00 AM Qatar time.
Will my .qa domain registered before that date be cancelled?
Not automatically, and it keeps renewing. But any change to its registration data or nameservers triggers an eligibility check, and it can be deleted if you do not qualify.
Does changing an A or MX record trigger verification?
According to QHost, it normally involves no registry transaction if the nameservers stay the same, but CRA has not separately specified the treatment of every scenario.
Can a .qa domain be sold or rented?
No. Section 5.17.5 of the CRA policy prohibits selling, renting or leasing a .qa domain to another party.
How long is the redemption period after deletion?
30 days, during which the domain is removed from the zone file and the website and email stop, followed by one day in pending delete before final purge.
Is a trademark registered in Egypt enough?
The official com.qa text requires a trademark registered in the State of Qatar. Protection can be extended to Qatar through the Madrid System, but the registry has not officially confirmed that it accepts this route.
You can review the full list of registry policies on the Qatar Domains Registry Policies page. If you would like our team to review your Qatari domains before any transfer or change, contact us and we will plan a safe path with you.
