HOSTING / DIRECT THE TRAFFIC
DNS Hosting Explained
Authoritative DNS hosting publishes the directions for your domain. It does not store your website or mailbox. You can use a separate company for your domain registration, DNS, website and email.
What You Are Buying
Your registrar delegates the domain to authoritative nameservers. Those nameservers publish records such as A/AAAA for addresses, CNAME for aliases, MX for incoming mail, and TXT for verification or email authentication. A recursive resolver asks for and caches those answers on a visitor’s behalf; choosing a public resolver is not the same as buying authoritative DNS hosting.
When You Would Use It
- Connect one domain to a website, a separate email platform and other applications.
- Change a service destination without transferring the domain registration.
- Use features such as DNSSEC, API automation, traffic steering or health checks when the specific requirement justifies them.
What You Still Manage
You control the accuracy of records and who may edit them. Keep an exported record inventory, protect DNS and registrar accounts with MFA, and coordinate DNSSEC changes with the registrar. Replacing nameservers without copying mail records can break email even when the website works.
Privacy Considerations
Public authoritative DNS records are intended to be discoverable; do not put passwords, personal details or secret access tokens in TXT records or hostnames. Recursive DNS providers can see the queries they receive, while authoritative providers see queries reaching their servers, often from resolvers rather than the original visitor. Encrypted DNS protects a transport leg, not the secrecy of published records. Ask about query logging, access, retention and secondary DNS providers.
Compare provider access, logs, retention and encryption →
Consumption, Allowances & “Unlimited”
Plans may charge per DNS zone, query, record, health check or advanced routing policy. A DNS zone is not a server. “Unlimited records” does not necessarily include unlimited zones, queries or paid routing features. Query counts are not visitor counts because resolvers cache answers and one page can reference multiple hostnames.
Read the plan’s resource limits and acceptable-use policy together. Ask what happens at the threshold: an extra charge, reduced speed, rejected requests or suspension. Understand the billing language →
Questions to Ask Before Buying
- Are ordinary queries, health checks and advanced answers billed differently?
- Are there zone, record or API-rate limits?
- How do I export records and move nameservers safely?
- What service continues if a payment fails or a query allowance is exceeded?
The takeaway: Pay for dependable answers and the DNS features you will use—not a promise to host your website.
Technical reference: Cloudflare: authoritative and recursive DNS.
Linked for its explanation of the technology, not as a provider recommendation. Features and contract terms vary.