Go Daddy continued its phenomenal hostname growth through its domain name registry, but also had strong performance as measured by active sites – those which contain actual content, an approach that excludes parked domains and one-page template sites and is therefore a better barometer of growth for a hosting business. Rounding out the top five are dedicated server specialist EV1Servers and Yahoo, which focuses on shared hosting.

The Planet showed the largest percentage improvement in active sites, with a 2004 gain of 490%. It was one of six providers to at least double the number of active sites between December 2003 and this month. The list showed some international flavor, with Lycos Europe and Komplex reflecting strong growth in Europe, while Japan’s SRS/Sakura fcuses on the Asia/Pacific market. Rounding out the top percentage gainers are Go Daddy and Pegasus Web Technologies, which this year rebranded as Fortress ITX, and includes both the Pegasus shared hosting operation and the DedicatedNow.com dedicated server business.

Top Hosting Providers By Percentage Growth, Dec 03 to Dec 04 Hosting Company Dec 03 Dec 04 % Growth Growth Primary Country The Planet 67,426 398,325 490.8% 330,899 Americas Lycos Europe 36,098 134,092 271.5% 97,994 Europe Go Daddy 120,175 326,524 171.7% 206,349 Americas Pegasus Web Tech 39,038 95,102 143.6% 56,064 Americas Komplex 64,570 144,234 123.4% 79,664 Europe SRS Sakura Internet 32,111 68,732 114.1% 36,621 Asia/Pacific

Netcraft’s Hosting Provider Switching Analysis identifies movements of sites from one hosting provider to another on a monthly basis. Please contact us for further details.