How to Use NameBio for Domain Comps | DomainGlossary.com

I once paid $1,200 for a domain because I found three comps on NameBio that "proved" it was worth $5,000+. Turns out I was reading the data wrong. Those sales were outliers from 2015, in a niche that had since cooled off, and two of them were .com while mine was .net. I eventually sold that name for $380.

That experience taught me something: NameBio is incredibly powerful, but only if you know how to use it honestly. Cherry-picking comps to justify a price you already want to believe is the fastest way to lose money in domain investing.

Let me walk you through how I actually use NameBio — the searches, the filters, and the mental habits that make comp research useful instead of dangerous.

What NameBio Actually Is

NameBio is a free database of historical domain name sales. As of this writing, it tracks over 600,000 verified transactions from marketplaces like Sedo, Afternic, GoDaddy Auctions, NameJet, and others. When someone talks about pulling "comps" — comparable sales — for a domain, NameBio is usually where they start.

Think of it like Zillow for domains, except there's no algorithm trying to give you an instant valuation. You get raw sales data, and it's on you to interpret it. That's both the strength and the risk.

Start With the Right Search

The search bar on NameBio looks simple, but there's more going on than people realize. When you type a keyword, you're searching domain names that contain that word and have actually sold. Not listed — sold.

Here's what I do first: I search for the exact domain I'm evaluating, just to see if it has prior sales history. You'd be surprised how often a name has changed hands before. If it sold for $300 two years ago and someone is asking $3,000 today, that's useful context.

If no exact match exists (which is common), you move to true comp research. This is where things get interesting.

How to Pull Comps That Actually Mean Something

Let's say you're evaluating GreenRoofing.com. Here's how I'd approach it.

Step 1: Search the exact keyword. Type "roofing" into NameBio. You'll get a list of every domain containing "roofing" that has a recorded sale. Sort by date to see recent transactions — anything older than 3 years is less reliable as a price signal.

Step 2: Filter by TLD. This matters enormously. A .com sale is not a comp for a .net domain. Period. If you're evaluating a .com, filter for .com only. NameBio lets you do this in the advanced search. Use it every time.

Step 3: Look at the pattern, not the peaks. You'll see a range. Maybe most "roofing" .com domains sold between $500 and $4,000, with a couple at $15,000+. Those high-end sales probably had something extra — shorter length, higher search volume, or a motivated end user. The cluster in the middle is your realistic range.

Step 4: Check the sale venue. NameBio shows where each sale happened. A domain that sold at GoDaddy Auctions for $800 is a very different signal than one that sold through a broker for $8,000. Auction sales tend to reflect wholesale value — what another investor would pay. Broker sales are more likely to reflect retail or end-user value. Both are valid comps, but you need to know which type you're looking at.

The Filters Most People Ignore

NameBio's advanced search has filters that separate useful research from guessing. The ones I use most:

Date range: I usually set this to the last 2–3 years. Domain prices shift over time. A sale from 2014 might be meaningless now, especially for new gTLDs.
Price range: If I'm deciding whether a $2,000 asking price is fair, I'll sometimes set the floor at $1,000 to see what caliber of names are selling in that neighborhood.
Character count: A 6-character domain and a 14-character domain are not comparable, even if they share a keyword. Length affects value significantly. Filter accordingly.
TLD: I said this already. I'm saying it again because I still see people on NamePros comparing .io sales to .com sales like they're interchangeable.

What NameBio Can't Tell You

This is where I see beginners get tripped up the most. NameBio records sales that were reported by participating marketplaces. It does not capture every domain sale that ever happened. Private sales, direct negotiations, and transactions on smaller platforms often go unrecorded.

This means the data skews toward auction-style sales and marketplace transactions. End-user sales — where a business buys a domain directly from an investor, usually at a premium — are underrepresented. In my experience, the actual market for good domains is often stronger than what NameBio alone suggests.

Also, NameBio can't tell you why a domain sold for a particular price. Was it an end user who needed it for a rebrand? Was it an investor buying a portfolio lot? Was there a bidding war, or did one person place a single bid at the reserve? Context matters, and the database doesn't have it.

How I Use Comps When Pricing My Own Domains

Here's my actual process when I'm setting a BIN price (Buy It Now) on a domain I own:

Pull 10–20 comps from NameBio using the keyword and TLD filters above.
Throw out the top 2 and bottom 2 — they're probably not representative.
Look at the median of what's left, not the average. One high sale can skew an average badly.
If most of those comps are auction sales, I multiply by 2–3x to estimate retail value. This isn't scientific, but it's a reasonable rule of thumb. Auction prices tend to be what investors pay; end users pay more.
I check whether the domain has anything the comps didn't — exact match for a high-CPC keyword, shorter length, cleaner brandability. If yes, I price toward the high end. If it's weaker than the comps, I price lower.

I'm not pretending this is exact. Domain valuation is part data, part gut, part knowing your buyer. But comps give you a foundation so you're not just making up numbers.

Common Mistakes I've Made (and Seen Others Make)

Comparing across TLDs. I already beat this drum, but it's the most common error. A three-word .com and a three-word .xyz are different products with different buyer pools.

Using old data without adjusting. The domain market in 2017 was different from 2024. If your best comps are all five years old, you might be looking at a niche that has dried up — or one that's grown. Check Google Trends for the keyword to see which direction things are moving.

Confusing listing prices with sale prices. NameBio shows actual sales. Estibot and some appraisal tools show estimated values. These are not the same thing. A domain "appraised" at $10,000 that has zero comps above $2,000 is probably not a $10,000 domain.

Only looking for comps that support the price you want. This is confirmation bias, and it will cost you money. If you're pulling 30 comps to find the three that support a high valuation, you're not doing research — you're writing fiction.

A Few Power-User Tips

NameBio has a "Sales History" feature where you can see if a specific domain has sold multiple times. This is gold for understanding appreciation trends. If a domain sold for $500 in 2019 and $2,400 in 2023, that tells you something real about demand.

You can also browse by category. If you invest in a specific niche — say, finance or health — browsing recent sales in that category can reveal pricing trends before they become obvious.

And bookmark this habit: every time you buy or sell a domain, go check NameBio to see if the transaction shows up. Over time, this helps you understand which of your sales venues report data and which don't.

The Honest Takeaway

NameBio is the best free resource for domain comp research. I use it almost every day. But it's a tool, not an oracle. The data is only as good as your ability to filter it, interpret it, and resist the temptation to see what you want to see. Pull comps honestly, and they'll save you from bad buys and help you price your names with confidence. Pull them lazily, and you'll end up like 2016 me — holding a .net you overpaid for, wondering where the math went wrong.