Choosing DNS Record Types

Domain Name Systems (DNS) use different record types for different purposes. This article helps you determine which record type you should use when creating a DNS record in the Cloud Control Panel.

A or AAAA

Type A is an IPv4 address record. Type AAAA is an IPv6 Address record, so use this record type if your server has an IPv6 address as a target.

Use an A or AAAA record to point to an IP address. In simple cases, you might have a single A or AAAA record as your base record pointing to a single IP address. Often, there are A or AAAA records that point to different IP addresses.

Note: If you have a base record (not required), it must be an A or AAAA record. For example, you could have www.mydomain.com as an A record that points to 1.2.3.4, and www.domain.com might be a CName record that points to www.myotherimportantdomain.com. Likewise, you might have a mail.domain.com record pointing to 5.6.7.8.

Canonical Name (CName)

Use a CName record to point to another domain name. For example, point mail.mydomain.com to mydomain.com.

Mail Exchange (MX)

Use an MX record for mail delivery. For example, creating an MX record for domain.com enables you to set up an email address like mailto:[email protected].

Name Server (NS)

Use an NS record to delegate an authoritative DNS server for a domain or subdomain.

Server Locator Record (SLR)

Use an SLR to assign a host and port for certain services, such as a Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP), for a domain.

Service Record (SRV)

SRV records specifies both the hostname and the port number for a specific service. This would be useful for something like a Voice over IP (VoIP) service.

Text (TXT)

Use a TXT record to store data types, such as Sender Policy Framework (SPF) or DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) records.