Cloudflare
Last updated
Last updated
This tutorial will guide you through the steps necessary to host your DNS on Cloudflare using their free service. You can follow this guide either when using our free hosting or when using a VPS.
Cloudflare is a global CDN and also a DNS hosting service which has both free and paid plans.
To begin, you will need to sign up for a free Cloudflare account here.
Go to your Cloudflare dashboard and at the top of your screen click on Add site
:
Enter your domain (without www
) and click the Add site
button:
On the bottom of that page, select Cloudflare's free plan and click on the Continue
button:
Cloudflare will attempt to automatically detect and import your existing DNS records.
If Cloudflare's automatic fetching fails or does not capture all necessary DNS records, you may need to manually import them.
To do so, select the relevant text block for your server below, and save it as a text file on your computer.
Open and exit the text file, making sure to replace yourdomain.com
with your actual domain. Be careful not to change anything else, as this could break the DNS zone file.
Inside your Cloudflare dashboard, click on Import DNS Records
and select the text file you saved from the previous step to upload it to Cloudflare.
After Cloudflare has imported your DNS records (automatically or manually via the text file), they will display your nameservers.
Copy and add both nameservers to your domain's nameservers setting inside your domain registrar's dashboard/panel.
If you are unsure how to set nameservers inside your domain registrar's dashboard/panel, please reach out to your domain registrar's customer support.
Then, return to your Cloudflare dashboard and click on Done, check nameservers
in the Cloudflare dashboard.
If you want to manually configure your Cloudflare settings, then set the A
and AAAA
records for the base domain to the IPs shown in Plesk, and create a CNAME for www
that’s pointed to your domain.
If you need email to work, you will also need additional records: an MX
, and 2 TXT
records for SPF
and DKIM
.