The short answer on 3 letter domain value: in Q3 2026, three-letter .com names (LLL, letters only) sold publicly for a median of $31,750, with a 5th-percentile “floor” of $11,565. Those are quarterly statistics from ten public sales, not a price for any name, and the spread around them is wide. Sales figures below come from published charts and reports, checked on 24 October 2026, and keep their reported status.
The 3 letter domain price in Q3 2026
GGRG’s Liquid Market Report for 3L .com domains tracks all 17,576 letter-only .coms each quarter, using sales data provided by ShortNames.com. The page rolls over when the next report is published, so these are its Q3 2026 numbers.
| Metric, Q3 2026 | Value |
|---|---|
| Inventory | 17,576 |
| Developed | 19% |
| Public sales | 10 |
| Median public sale | $31,750 |
| 5th percentile (“floor”) | $11,565 |
| Public sales volume | $552,050 |
| Escrow.com sales volume | $21,817,676 |
GGRG defines the 5th percentile as a value two standard deviations below the mean sale price, “a reasonable category price floor in any given time period”. It is a statistic, not a guaranteed bid. GGRG also shows the median down 33.51% and the floor down 27.61%, without saying against which period. The bigger signal is the escrow figure: GGRG says 3L .coms took about 69% of Escrow.com’s reported total for the quarter, so most of the money changes hands privately rather than in public sales.
Why every three-letter .com is taken
There are only 26 × 26 × 26 = 17,576 combinations. Two independent 2026 scans found all of them registered. Findadomain.name (2026), in a snapshot dated 23 October, queried each name’s authoritative nameservers and checked the registry’s RDAP record for the 39 with no nameservers, which a plain DNS lookup would wrongly show as free. DnDigger, on 27 July, called it “a fully closed namespace”. Its dataset shows how old some holdings are, with BBN.com registered in April 1985, and how recent others are: registration dates reset when a name drops and is caught again, as AAE.com was in May 2026. No registry statement was found, so the claim rests on those scans.
DnDigger also notes that some names sit with corporate brand-protection registrars, so “a meaningful slice of this namespace isn’t for sale at any price”. An ABT Domain WHOIS analysis of May 2026 counted 1,468 LLL .coms listed for sale, most of them on Afternic (849), followed by Sedo (288), Atom (231) and DN.COM (100). If you want 3 letter domains for sale, that is the pool: listed names, or an approach to an owner who has not listed.
Reported LLL .com sales, 2025–2026
The chart-toppers come from DNJournal’s 2026 year-to-date chart and its 2025 Top 100; the lower rows are from GGRG’s Q3 2026 list and recent daily reports. All are reported sales, not independently confirmed, and dates are when the source published them.
| Domain | Price | Venue | Date | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| NAS.com | $1,250,000 | Lumis | Apr 2026 | Reported (DNJournal) |
| NOR.com | $700,000 | K-Ventures/Atom.com | Oct 2026 | Reported (DNJournal) |
| HSM.com | $550,000 | K-Ventures | Nov 2025 | Reported (DNJournal 2025) |
| TXT.com | $502,250 | Fruits.co | Apr 2026 | Reported (DNJournal) |
| Bar.com / Pub.com | $500,000 each | Defining.com | Apr 2026 | Reported (DNJournal) |
| UIG.com | $280,000 | Afternic | May 2025 | Reported (DNJournal 2025) |
| KBF.com | $260,000 | Legal Brand Marketing | Jul 2026 | Reported (DNJournal, GGRG) |
| ETE.com | $250,000 | 4L.com/Afternic | Oct 2026 | Reported (DNJournal) |
| TII.com | $170,000 | DomainBooth/Atom.com | Jan 2026 | Reported (DNJournal) |
| OKP.com | $150,000 | Dynadot | Jul 2025 | Reported (DNJournal 2025) |
| YAL.com | $139,000 | Sedo | Apr 2026 | Reported (DNJournal) |
| INO.com | $130,000 | QEIP.com | Jul 2026 | Reported (DNJournal) |
| RYU.com | $76,000 | Not stated | Jul 2026 | Reported (GGRG) |
| ISY.com / DGF.com | $45,000 each | Not stated | Jul 2026 | Reported (GGRG) |
| KLO.com | $39,500 | Not stated | Sep 2026 | Reported (GGRG) |
| qda.com | $26,016 | Dynadot | Oct 2026 | Reported (daily report) |
| mzs.com | $25,500 | GoDaddy | Oct 2026 | Reported (daily report) |
| ZST.com | $24,000 | Not stated | Jul 2026 | Reported (GGRG) |
| VKQ.com | $8,755 | Not stated | Aug 2026 | Reported (GGRG) |
The top of the table is not the market. Only three LLL .coms made DNJournal’s 2025 Top 100, and nine of GGRG’s ten Q3 public sales were under $80,000. For the wider list of 2026’s biggest deals, see the top domain sales of 2026. Atom’s Zack Gabor said NOR.com’s buyer “had a clear objective—to acquire a three-letter .com domain”, which is the demand that keeps the floor in five figures.
What makes some 3-letter domains dearer
Real words sit at the top: Bar.com and Pub.com sold for $500,000 each in 2026, alongside acronyms. That is an observation from the chart; no source puts a number on a word premium.
The letter rules come from older commentary in Domain Name Wire, and should be read as such. A 2016 guest study by Michael Robini defined “Chinese premium” names as those without a, e, i, o, u and v, and “Western premium” as those without j, k, q, u, v, w, x, y and z. In February 2020, Kassey Lee wrote that VQD.com sold for “a mere $8,440”, possibly because of the “v”, while noting “V isn’t popular in the West, but it is in China”. In March 2020 he added that “X can be an acronym for over 1,000 Pinyin words” and F and K for about 600 each, pointing to demand from Chinese end users to shorten their names and go global. None of this is 2026 price data, though VKQ.com sitting at the bottom of GGRG’s Q3 list fits the pattern.
Three-letter names in other extensions
Outside .com, the price depends heavily on the extension. These are from DNJournal’s 2025 and 2026 charts.
| Domain | Price | Venue | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Act.ai | $375,000 | Spaceship | 2026 |
| Law.ai | $350,000 | Sedo | 2025 |
| Neo.ai | $275,000 | Domain Booth/Atom.com | 2026 |
| GGG.org | $60,840 (€52,000) | Sedo | 2026 |
| Orb.io | $52,700 | Afternic | 2025 |
| Ben.net | $35,750 | Sedo | 2026 |
.ai is the exception: three-letter word names there have reached six figures, and Bot.ai sold for $1.2 million through Sedo in 2026. In 2025, Sim.ai ($220,000), Ace.ai ($205,000) and Zip.ai ($200,000) also cleared the LLL .com median by a wide margin, and SIDN called Law.ai “comfortably the biggest sale” among Sedo’s .ai deals that year. Three-letter .org and .net sales on the charts mostly sit between about $10,000 and $60,000, near the LLL .com floor rather than its median. For what separates a premium name from an ordinary one in any extension, see premium domain names.
What this means if you buy or sell
As a buyer, budget from the quarterly median and floor, not from the headline sales, and expect to pay an owner’s price because there is nothing left to register. Letters, real words and the buyer’s purpose move individual names far from the median. As a seller, the floor is a reference, not an offer; a name with “v” or awkward letters may sell near or below it. Four-letter names are a separate, much larger market, covered in 4-letter domain value.
The limit: ten public sales a quarter is a thin sample, and most money moves privately through escrow, so any median can swing hard from one quarter to the next.
Frequently asked questions
How much is a 3-letter .com worth?
In Q3 2026, GGRG recorded a median public sale of $31,750 and a 5th-percentile floor of $11,565. Individual names have sold from under $9,000 to $1.25 million.
Can I still register a 3-letter .com?
No. Two independent 2026 scans, by Findadomain.name and DnDigger, found all 17,576 registered, so every one has to be bought from its owner.
Are 3-letter domains in other extensions cheaper?
Usually, except .ai. Charted .org and .net sales mostly fell between about $10,000 and $60,000, while .ai names such as Act.ai reached $375,000.
The takeaway A three-letter .com is a five-figure asset at the floor and rarely a seven-figure one. Before you name a price, run it through the Domain Worth Calculator, which maps a name to a value band factor by factor, then check it against the quarter’s public sales.
