Non-EU vendorDomain Name RegistrarsHeadquarters: US

Squarespace Domains: sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

Squarespace Domains is the domain registration service of the website platform Squarespace. Customers can search for, register, transfer and manage domain names, and according to the FAQ on the site, no Squarespace website is required. It operates as an ICANN-accredited registrar, and domains are managed through an online account and DNS settings.

The registrar is operated through Squarespace Domains II LLC, a company within the Squarespace group. Squarespace, Inc. is based in New York, and the group was taken private in 2024 by the British private equity firm Permira. The privacy policy states that personal data is transferred to Squarespace, Inc. in the United States and mentions US servers. For users outside the United States, Squarespace Ireland Limited is named as the controller. For a European organisation, the US parent and the US server location mean that requests from US authorities can reach data held by the group, which should be weighed when choosing a registrar.

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Sovereignty score

17 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign

Jurisdiction SOV-210
Headquartered in the US: CLOUD Act and FISA 702
Data residency SOV-30
No hosting in Europe (US)
Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-320
Key management with a non-European vendor
Freedom from lock-in SOV-640
Closed source: switching requires data migration
Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-615
Closed source, runtime with the vendor

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked October 10, 2026

Headquarters	US (US)Verified by hand
Ultimate parent company	GBVerified by hand
EU adequacy decision	Only for companies individually certified under the EU-US Data Privacy FrameworkVerified by hand
Sovereignty model	Vendor-hosted (non-EU)Verified by hand
Data hosting	USVerified by hand
Open-source	NoVerified by hand
GDPR-compliant	YesVendor-stated
Category	Domain Name Registrars
Type	Product
Website	domains.squarespace.com ↗

How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to Squarespace Domains

The European alternatives to Squarespace Domains come from our knowledge base of over 6,800 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

35 European Domain Name Registrars vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with Squarespace Domains

Squarespace Domains is headquartered in the United States. US vendors fall under the CLOUD Act and FISA 702: US authorities can compel access to data, even when that data sits in a European data centre. That is the core of the jurisdictional exposure in our model. The ultimate owner is based in GB. Foreign control undermines part of the certainty a European headquarters offers.

Squarespace Domains hosts data outside the EU (US). Personal data therefore leaves the EU, which requires a transfer mechanism under the GDPR and pulls the data residency score down.

Squarespace Domains is closed source and hosted by the vendor. The encryption keys and the runtime sit with the vendor and switching requires data migration. Ask about bring-your-own-key, export options and open standards.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs Squarespace Domains together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to Squarespace Domains?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to Squarespace Domains include 101domain, Afnic and Aruba Domains. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to Squarespace Domains?

Our list of EU alternatives to Squarespace Domains is mostly commercial options. Browse the category on the map for open-source choices.

Is Squarespace Domains GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

Squarespace Domains is headquartered in US and hosts data in US. The vendor states it is GDPR-compliant, but the data falls under non-EU jurisdiction. For full EU data residency the EU alternatives on this page usually offer more certainty.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on October 10, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Digital sovereignty in Domain Name Registrars

Domain Name Registrars: Companies that register and manage internet domain names. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

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