Get a Free Locality Domain: How to Claim *.city.state.us Subdomains

You can get a free subdomain under your city's .city.state.us namespace. Fred Chan's recent guide on setting up a locality domain struck a nostalgic chord on Hacker News, revealing a hidden corner of the internet that's both bureaucratic and surprisingly accessible.

How to Get a Free Locality Domain

In the US, the .us country-code TLD is structured hierarchically by geography: state.us, then city.state.us. Under each city, you can request a subdomain like example.anytown.ca.us. The Neustar registry, which manages .us, allows individuals and organizations to request these subdomains for free—as long as you follow the paperwork. It's not a click-to-buy process; you fill out a template and email someone, and they provision DNS delegation if everything checks out.

Fred Chan's original guide walks through the steps: find your city's state subdomain, check if it's already delegated (likely), and then request a child zone. It's a process that feels straight out of the 1990s internet, yet it still works today.

Why This Struck a Chord on Hacker News

The thread resonated because it taps into internet history. One commenter reflected:

Seeing the *.k12.oh.us in the delegated subdomains brought me back to highschool. When I was little I always wondered why the city name was before k12. Didn't know it was structured like that everywhere.

Another brought up the old ISP era:

Seeing the list of contacts for delegated subdomains reminds me of a time when there were a lot more local ISP's.

The conversation also touched on quirks: the .us TLD doesn't allow WHOIS privacy, so your address is public if you register—a concern for privacy. Commenter dspillett noted that these subdomains end up on the Public Suffix List (PSL), which means they're treated as top-level by browsers for cookie scoping, creating potential security issues.

DNS Delegation and WHOIS Privacy Concerns

This is a fascinating relic of internet governance. The .us locality system was designed in the late 90s to mirror physical geography, but it never became popular. Most people are on .com. Still, it's a reminder that the DNS is more flexible than typical domain registrars let on.

The fact that it's free but requires emailing a human is both charming and a barrier. For builders, it's a chance to get a branded subdomain for a local community project—like a neighborhood website or a mail server—without paying for a .com. But there are real trade-offs: no WHOIS privacy, and the PSL issue means you can't run cookie-based auth across multiple subdomains of the same city without sharing cookies with others who also have subdomains there.

The PSL problem is especially thorny. As one commenter put it:

Some similarities to *.<lastname>.name -- one of which is that the Public Suffix List thinks you're part of a single site with others you have no control over.

If you plan to use your locality domain for web apps or authentication, be aware that browsers treat the entire city.state.us as a public suffix. That means cookies set on example.anytown.state.us won't be sent to other.anytown.state.us—which is good for isolation. But if you need to share cookies across subdomains within your own zone, you can't because the PSL treats your zone as a TLD. So you'd need to use a deeper subdomain like www.example.anytown.state.us to get a proper site hierarchy.

What This Means for Builders

If you're building a local community site, a hobby project, or just want a unique email address (e.g., hello@myproject.mytown.ca.us), this is worth exploring. The process is straightforward:

1. Find the zone file for your state (e.g., ca.us) and look for your city's NS records. If they exist, the city zone is already delegated.
2. Contact the city zone admin to request a subzone. They'll ask for your desired name, contact info, and two authoritative nameservers.
3. Once approved, set up DNS on your nameservers for that zone.

Here's a sample delegation request (based on the guide):

To: admin@city.state.us
Subject: Delegation request for subdomain.city.state.us

I request delegation of subdomain.city.state.us.
Domain Contact Information:
  Name: Your Name
  Organization: Your Org
  Address: 123 Main St
  City, State, Zip
  Phone: +1-555-555-5555
  Email: you@example.com
Nameservers:
  ns1.example.com (IP)
  ns2.example.com (IP)

Signature/agreement to abide by .US policies.

Before diving in, consider the WHOIS privacy issue. Unlike .com, .us registries do not permit privacy services. Your full legal name and address will be visible in WHOIS. If that concerns you, skip it.

Also, if you plan to serve a web app, test how the PSL affects your cookies. You may need to use a deeper domain like www.subdomain.city.state.us to have a proper subdomain structure for your own site.

Should You Care?

If you're a hobbyist, local organizer, or want a free, quirky domain for a non-critical project—yes, give it a shot. The process is a fun throwback and yields a unique URL. If you need privacy, reliability, or want to run a commercial service, skip it. The *.us locality system is a niche curiosity, not a replacement for traditional domains. But it's a reminder that the internet still has hidden doors worth opening.

Explore the HN discussion and the original guide for more details. Check the .US registry policies and the Public Suffix List for implications.