Renewing a domain and preventing expiry.

A lapsed domain is the #1 cause of "I lost my business overnight" stories. This is how to avoid that.

Two ways to renew

Domains are renewed one year at a time.

Renew manually. New panel (rivervo.com/panel): open the domain's project → Domain tab → Renew → pay by card or from your balance. A year is added to the expiry date.

Turn on auto-renew. Same tab → the Auto-renew switch. Auto-renew is a yearly card subscription: turning it on pays for the next year right away, and after that your card is charged once a year.

Auto-renew is off after you register a domain — you decide whether to turn it on.

Some older domains (on our previous registrar) can only be renewed from balance; the panel shows this on the Domain tab.

Reminders

We remind you before a domain expires — by email and, if you've connected it, by Telegram (Account settings → Notifications → Connect Telegram). Reminders start about a month before the expiry date and get more frequent in the last week.

Make sure our emails don't land in spam, and keep your account email one you actually read.

If an auto-renew payment fails

Domain tab → Pay with another card. Fix it before the expiry date — see Updating your payment method.

What happens when a domain expires

• The domain stops working. Your website and email on that domain stop, because the domain no longer resolves.
• Nameservers can't be changed and DNS records can't be edited until the domain is renewed.
• You can usually still renew it from the Domain tab for a while after expiry — renew as soon as possible, before someone else can register it.
• A long-expired domain may no longer be renewable from the panel. Once the registry releases it, anyone can register it. If the panel won't let you renew, write to support right away (Help → Write to us, topic Domains & DNS) — a specialist will check what's still possible.

How long an expired domain stays recoverable, and what recovering it costs, depends on the extension's registry rules — don't rely on it.

Multi-year registration

When you register a new domain, some extensions offer 2 or 3 years up front (the panel shows the options available for that extension). Less to forget about. Renewals afterwards are one year at a time.

Don't be that person

Turn on auto-renew for any domain you care about, keep a valid card on it, and keep your account email current. We'll do our part with reminders, but the final responsibility is yours.

Don't want to renew?

A registered domain can't be deleted — it stays until its registration ends. To let it go, turn off Auto-renew and don't renew it.