The EU institutions have adopted a Regulation laying down procedures for the administration of a new ".eu" top level domain. When the procedures are implemented, registration of domain names will be available to companies established in the EU (including subsidiaries of non-EU companies) and persons resident in the EU.

The administration of the domain will be carried out by a private, not-for-profit Registry selected by the European Commission by open tender. It is intended that in addition there should be various competing registrars with access to the domain. Other roles of the Registry will include dispute resolution, for which it will implement a process taking into account WIPO rules.

No system for the allocation of ".eu" names has yet been specified and this will be adopted at a later date, in accordance with public policy rules set by the European Commission. The Regulation specifically provides that a first-come first-served system for allocation should be considered, as used for some EU Member State national domains (e.g. the UK’s “.co..uk.” but not for example in the case of the Spanish ".es" domain, for which registration requires an existing company name or trade mark corresponding to the name applied for). A "sunrise" period is planned which would allow rights holders and public bodies preferential rights of registration of their names. The EU Member States have already presented lists of geographic or geopolitical names which they wish to prevent other parties from registering.

Once the Registry has been created, it will need to conclude an agreement with ICANN in order to open the registration process. No pre-registration will be possible. However, the European Commission has said that it expects that ".eu" domain names could be available in 2003.