How to connect your domain to your website

Open the help section of almost any website builder and you will find the same question posted hundreds of times. "I registered my domain but my website is not showing up. What went wrong?" How to connect your domain to your website is a short process, but the steps are unfamiliar the first time and most guides leave people stuck right where it matters most.

Connecting your domain to your website is a short process, but the steps are unfamiliar the first time. The confusion usually starts because a domain, a hosting account, and a website builder can each come from a different company, and most guides skip explaining how those three relate before jumping to the steps. Knowing how they talk to each other is what makes this process make sense. Once it does, the actual steps take about ten minutes.

What is the relationship between a domain, hosting, and a website?

Think of it in three parts. Your domain is your address. Your hosting is the building at that address. Your website is what is inside the building. All three need to be in place, and the domain needs to point to the right location before visitors can find you. If you want to understand what hosting is and how to evaluate a plan before making changes to your DNS, the article on what web hosting is covers the full picture.

These three things can be managed by the same company or by different ones. If you registered your domain with one provider and built your website with another, you will need to update the domain's settings to point it at your website's location. If you bought your domain directly through your website builder, this connection is usually made automatically and you may not need to do anything at all.

Understanding how domain names connect to server addresses is covered in more depth in the article on what DNS is and how it works. That context makes the steps below easier to follow.

What are the two ways to connect a domain?

There are two main methods for pointing a domain at a website. Both achieve the same result. The difference is which settings you change and what level of control it gives you over other services like email.

The first method is updating your nameservers. Nameservers tell the internet which DNS provider manages your domain's records. Pointing them at your hosting provider hands over full control of your domain's DNS to that provider. It is the simpler method technically, but it replaces all existing DNS records, including any email records you may have set up.

The second method is updating your A record. An A record is a specific DNS entry that maps your domain directly to your hosting provider's IP address. This method changes only that one record and leaves everything else, including email, intact.

Which method should you use?

The answer depends on whether you have a business email address set up on your domain.

If you have a professional email address using your domain and you switch nameservers, your email will stop working. The new nameservers will not have your email records. To fix it you would need to manually recreate those records with your new DNS provider. If you want to avoid that risk entirely, use the A record method instead. It leaves your email untouched.

If you are starting fresh with no email set up yet, changing nameservers is the simpler path. Your hosting or website builder provider will give you two nameserver addresses to copy in. The DNS is then fully managed by them and updates happen automatically when you add features or change plans.

Before you switch nameservers, note down your current DNS records if any exist. Most registrar dashboards show a list of your current records. Screenshot them or copy them somewhere before you make any changes. That list is your rollback reference if something goes wrong.

How do you connect using nameservers?

Your hosting provider or website builder will give you two nameserver addresses. They typically look like ns1.providername.com and ns2.providername.com. These are usually found in your hosting dashboard, in your account welcome email, or in the platform's help documentation.

Once you have them, log in to your domain registrar, find your domain management settings, and look for the nameservers section. Replace the existing nameserver values with the ones from your hosting provider. Save the change. Most registrars apply this immediately on their end, but the change takes time to spread across the internet.

How do you connect using an A record?

Your hosting provider will give you an IP address. It looks like a string of numbers separated by dots. Log in to your domain registrar and go to the DNS management section for your domain. Find the A record for your root domain, which is usually shown as @ or as your bare domain name. Update the value to the IP address your host provided.

If your host also requires a CNAME record for the www version of your domain, add that at the same time. A CNAME for www typically points to your bare domain or to a specific address your host specifies. Your host's documentation will tell you exactly what is required.

What happens to your email when you change nameservers?

This is the step that catches people off guard. When you switch nameservers, you are handing DNS control to a new provider. That new provider does not automatically know about your existing email setup. If you had MX records at your old DNS provider pointing your email to a mail service, those records do not carry over.

Before switching nameservers, copy down your existing MX records from your current DNS settings. After the switch, recreate those records in your new DNS provider's dashboard. If you use the A record method instead of nameservers, your existing email records are untouched and this is not a concern.

How long does DNS propagation take?

DNS propagation is the process of your updated domain settings spreading to DNS servers around the world. When you change a nameserver or an A record, that change does not appear everywhere instantly. Different DNS servers update at different times based on something called TTL, or Time to Live, which is a timer that tells DNS servers how long to cache a record before checking for updates.

For most changes, propagation completes within a few hours. In some cases it can take up to 48 hours. During that window you may notice that your domain resolves correctly on your phone but still shows the old result on your laptop, or vice versa. This is normal. Your browser or device has a local DNS cache that has not updated yet. Clearing your browser cache or flushing your local DNS can sometimes show the updated result sooner.

Tools like whatsmydns.net let you check how your domain is resolving from different locations around the world. If it is showing the correct IP address in most regions, propagation is progressing normally.

How do you check if the connection worked?

The simplest check is typing your domain into a browser and seeing whether your website appears. But that can be misleading during propagation because of local caching. A more reliable check is using a DNS lookup tool.

On whatsmydns.net, enter your domain name, select A record, and run the search. The result will show what IP address your domain is resolving to from different server locations worldwide. If it matches the IP address your host gave you, the connection is working. If it still shows the old address in some regions, propagation is still in progress.

Once the connection is confirmed, check that your website loads correctly by visiting your domain directly. Check both the www and non-www versions to confirm both work as expected.

What should you sort out about SSL after connecting?

After connecting your domain, the next thing you will likely encounter is your browser showing a "not secure" warning. This happens when your site does not yet have an active SSL certificate on the new domain. SSL is the security protocol that puts the padlock icon in the address bar and encrypts the connection between your site and visitors.

Most hosting providers and website builders handle SSL automatically once your domain is connected and propagation is complete. If yours does not activate it automatically, look for the SSL section in your hosting dashboard. The article on what SSL is and why your website needs it explains the full picture if you want to understand what is happening before you configure it.

How does WEMASY handle domain connection?

WEMASY's website builder includes a domain connection tool in the dashboard. You can connect an existing domain by updating your nameservers to point at WEMASY, or by adding the domain directly through the platform's domain management interface. SSL is activated automatically once the domain is connected. Hosting is included in every plan, so there is no separate hosting account to configure. See what is included at the WEMASY website builder or review plans on the pricing page.

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