Significant changes to domain names in Australia have been
introduced in that from 24 March 2022 it is possible to apply to
licence .au direct domain names (domain names directly followed by
.au, for example madderns.au) through .au Domain Administration
(auDA) accredited registrars. Previously, it was only possible to
licence third level .au domain names (eg com.au, net.au, org.au,
asn.au, id.au and edu.au). This change brings Australia into line
with similar developments in other countries such as New Zealand
(.nz), United Kingdom (.uk), France (.fr), Germany (.de), Canada
(.ca) and China (.cn).
Following the launch of .au direct on 24 March 2022, all names
in the .au registry prior to the launch will be reserved from being
registered as .au domain names for a six month period from 24 March
2022 to 20 September 2022, which is known as the Priority
Allocation Period. During the Priority Allocation Period,
registrants of an existing exact match domain name in the
