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At Cloudways, we provide top-tier hosting solutions that empower your online presence. While we don't offer in-house DNS services, we've partnered with DNS Made Easy, a leading name in DNS management. With our DNS Made Easy add-on, you can effortlessly handle your domain's DNS records on the Cloudways platform. This means you spend less time navigating complex settings and more time focusing on what truly matters - your business.
In this article, we'll guide you through the straightforward process of launching DNS Made Easy so you can manage all your domains with the ease of Cloudways Platform.
Important
The enhanced DNS Made Easy add-on is exclusively available on Cloudways New Interface. However, if you are using the Old Interface, you can still subscribe to the add-on but can not manage the DNS records yourself. In such cases, our support team will assist you with pointing and managing the DNS records.
DNS Made Easy Features: Why Should You Use It?
Empower your online presence with the robust features offered by the DNS Made Easy add-on on Cloudways. This powerful tool is designed to optimize your DNS management experience, ensuring seamless connectivity for your visitors. Dive into a range of features that allow you to take control of your domain with ease:
DNS Made Easy is a potent tool to optimize your DNS management workflow and improve your experience. You can empower your online presence with its robust technology and features so that your websites are always reachable by your website visitors.
Simplified DNS Management: You can easily manage the DNS records for all your domains in one centralized location. Regardless of where you acquired your domains, you can leverage DNS Made Easy to consolidate and manage them all from Cloudways Platform.
DNS Failover: You can minimize downtime and enhance reliability with DNS failover. DNS Made Easy automatically redirects traffic to a secondary server in case of a primary server failure, ensuring uninterrupted service.
Time-to-Live (TTL): You can fine-tune the Time-to-Live settings for your DNS records. DNS Made Easy lets you optimize TTL values, balancing the need for quick IP address updates with efficient DNS query management.
Multiple Protocols: DNS Made Easy supports numerous protocols, providing compatibility with various services. This versatility ensures smooth integration with your preferred online tools and applications.
Multiple Locations: You can enhance the performance and reliability of your website by leveraging DNS Made Easy's capability to manage DNS records across various locations. You can distribute your online presence strategically for an optimized user experience.
DNS Made Easy Pricing
DNS Made Easy is a budget-friendly DNS management solution priced at just $0.50 per domain per month. With DNS Made Easy, you get a 500,000 DNS query quota per domain included in your subscription each month. These queries cover the normal usage of DNS resolution for your domains.
The DNS queries are allocated on a per-account basis. For instance, if you manage five domains monthly on DNS Made Easy, the total DNS queries allocated to your account will be 5x500,000=2,500,000 monthly.
If your website experiences higher DNS usage or requires additional queries beyond the allotted 500,000, we've got you covered. Any extra queries are billed at a rate of $0.01 per every 10,000 queries. This way, you only pay for the additional resources you need, ensuring a cost-effective and flexible DNS management solution for your specific requirements.
How to Launch the DNS Made Easy Add-on
Log in to your Cloudways Platform using your credentials.
From the left menu bar, open Add-ons.
Next, click DNS Made Easy.
Finally, click Get Started to launch the add-on.
Now, it's time to add domain(s) and take them live using DNS Made Easy.
How to Manage the DNS Made Easy Add-on
You can manage your DNS Made Easy add-on and do various things right from your Cloudways Platform:
1. Add Domain(s)
Here's how you can add domain(s) to manage them using DNS Made Easy:
First, click Add Domain.
Next, enter your domain, e.g., example.com. If you want to add multiple domains, you can click Add Domain and bulk add up to 10 domains.
Finally, click Save Changes.
Once your domain is added, it will appear as 'Inactive'. Now, you need to add the DNS Made Easy nameservers in your DNS registrar panel. The DNS registrar is the company from where you purchased your domain, e.g., GoDaddy, Namecheap, etc,.
Next, click Configure Nameservers.
Here, you'll find the nameservers that need to be copied and added to your DNS registrar panel. While we recommend adding all the provided nameservers, if your DNS registrar limits the number you can add, we suggest incorporating the maximum allowable nameservers.
Our domain was purchased from Namecheap, so we are adding these nameservers on Namecheap.
After adding the nameservers, you may need to wait as it takes 24-48 hours for the nameservers to propagate across the network. Once nameservers are propagated, you will see an 'Active' status against your domain.
After nameservers propagation, the next step is to manage your domain from the Cloudways Platform and add DNS records to take your website(s) live.
2. Manage DNS Record(s)
Here's how you can manage your DNS records using DNS Made Easy:
Add DNS Record(s)
First, click the ⋮ (ellipsis) icon to reveal more options and click Manage Records.
Next, click Add Record.
Next, you can start adding the DNS records you need. First of all, select the Record Type.
Now, add all the required information as per your chosen record type.
Finally, click Save Changes.
Tip:
To add multiple records at once, please click Add Record.
You can add Elastic Email and Rackspace DNS records at a single click by navigating to Template under Record Type.
You have learned how to add the DNS records. Please note that it may take 24-48 hours for the DNS records to propagate across the network.
Edit DNS Record(s)
First, click the ⋮ (ellipsis) icon to reveal more options and click Manage Records.
Next, click the ⋮ (ellipsis) icon of that particular DNS record and click Edit Record.
Next, edit the DNS records information and click Save Changes.
Delete DNS Record(s)
First, click the ⋮ (ellipsis) icon to reveal more options and click Manage Records.
Next, click the ⋮ (ellipsis) icon of that particular DNS record and click Delete Record.
3. Delete Domain(s)
Here's how you can delete your domain(s) using DNS Made Easy:
First, click the ⋮ (ellipsis) icon to reveal more options and click Delete Domain.
Next, you will be prompted to confirm the selection. You can click Unsubscribe to proceed further.
Once unsubscribed, DNS management for these domain(s) will no longer be handled through DNS Made Easy. You need to update your nameservers at your DNS registrar's end and add the new DNS records there.
Important
Deleting and subsequently reactivating the add-on for the same domain will be treated as a new subscription, incurring additional costs.
DNS Made Easy Query Usage
DNS queries are requests made by your website to a Domain Name System (DNS) server to translate human-readable domain names (like www.example.com) into IP addresses that computers use to identify each other on the internet. These queries are an essential part of how the internet functions, as they ensure your website visitors can access your site by finding the correct server.
How DNS Query Usage Increases
The number of DNS queries your website generates can increase for several reasons:
Website Traffic: As your website gains more visitors, the DNS queries naturally increase to serve those visitors.
Higher TTL: Setting a Time to Live (TTL) value higher than the default Auto setting, typically 1 or 2 minutes, can result in higher DNS query usage.
Content: If your website contains numerous resources like images, scripts, and stylesheets from different domains, it can trigger additional DNS queries.
Dynamic Content: Websites with dynamic content that change frequently may generate more DNS queries as visitors interact with various elements.
Additional Domains: Adding additional domains to your website, such as subdomains or third-party integrations, can increase DNS query usage.
Managing DNS Query Usage
To keep your DNS query usage within normal limits, consider the following best practices:
Server Caching/Application Caching: To check and optimize your application's caching settings, ensure you have enabled cache for your server.
Optimize Resources: Minimize the number of external resources on your site by combining files and reducing third-party integrations.
Content Delivery Networks (CDNs): Use CDNs to distribute content from servers geographically closer to your visitors, reducing the need for long DNS queries.
TTL Settings: Adjust the Time to Live (TTL) settings for your DNS records. Lower TTLs, e.g., 1 minute, can help if you switch IP addresses quickly, but be mindful of the increased DNS query volume. So, we recommend choosing a higher TTL.
Regular Monitoring: Keep an eye on your DNS query usage to detect unusual spikes and address them promptly.
How to Check DNS Query Usage
Here's how you can check the monthly DNS query usage of your subscription:
First, click the ⋮ (ellipsis) icon to reveal more options and click Manage Records.
Here, you will see the total queries on top, and for day-wise breakdown, you may navigate to the graph and review the information.
Important
Please note that this DNS Query Usage graph updates on a weekly basis.
That’s it! We hope this article was helpful. If you need any help, then feel free to search your query on Cloudways Support Center or contact us via chat (Need a Hand > Send us a Message). Alternatively, you can also create a support ticket.
Discover how simple it is to activate the DNS Made Easy add-on and take advantage of Cloudways' competitive pricing. Get started today! Check Pricing.
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