An explanation on what DNS is?
You may have heard of DNS, or Domain Name System, when you registered your domain or built a website. But what exactly is DNS, and why is it so important? DNS powers the internet by converting alphabetic names into numeric IP addresses—it makes it so you only need to remember a domain name, like coolexample.com, instead of a numeric IP address. DNS is the backbone of the internet, and without DNS, you wouldn't be able to send an email, scroll through Instagram, or play video games with friends.
Back in the old days when you wanted to call someone, you had to memorize their phone number, keep track of their number in a notebook or rolodex, or look it up in the giant paper phonebook. Today, our cell phones can store those phone numbers in the contacts list, and each number is mapped to a specific person or business. When you want to call your friend Jane, you don't have to remember her phone number—you just need to find her name in your contacts list and place the call.
You can think of DNS as the contacts list of the internet, but instead of mapping people to phone numbers, it maps domain names to IP addresses. And IP addresses are the language of the internet. Computers communicate with each other using Internet Protocol, or IP addresses, which are specific sets of numbers and letters, such as 50.63.202.40 (an IPv4 address) or 2001:0db8:85a3:0000:0000:6a2e:0371:7234 (an IPv6 address).
But those long strings of numbers and letters aren't very easy to remember. So, DNS maps IP addresses to human-friendly domain names, like coolexample.com. Remembering a domain name is usually a lot easier than keeping track of all those IP addresses, making it more enjoyable to surf the web.
You may have heard the phrase DNS query or DNS lookup when searching for info on DNS. These are common ways to reference how DNS works and gets you to a particular website. But there are a few steps along the way, so we'll break those out and describe each step. Heads up—we're about to get a bit technical.
Keep in mind that there are a few different stops DNS can take along the way, and sometimes things get stuck or don't work like we expect. And it can take up to 48 hours for DNS changes to show up on the internet globally. If you'd like more detail about how DNS works, check out this handy guide from Verisign.
Have you ever heard someone mention "changing nameservers" for your domain? That's because the last step in the query is checking the domain nameservers for that all-important IP address. But you need to have the correct nameservers before the query can find the correct IP address.
There are always at least two nameservers for a domain, and when nameservers are changed, the place where you manage DNS also changes. For example, if the domain is using default Wurk nameservers, the DNS zone file will be in your Wurk account. But if the domain is using nameservers for a different company, the DNS zone file will be with that company instead.
Now that you know a little about what DNS is and how it works, you're ready to start using DNS in your Wurk account. The easiest way to access your DNS is to sign in to your Wurk Domain Portfolio, click or tap directly on your domain name and then select DNS. You should see your DNS zone file now, which is where you'll—you guessed it—manage DNS for that particular domain.
From here, you can take on some of the most common DNS tasks:
Most DNS updates take effect within an hour, but could take up to 48 hours to update globally.
We get it—there are a lot of moving parts to managing DNS for your domains, and it can get confusing. We've worked hard to create a seamless experience when managing DNS, and we're always working to improve. If you get stuck or have questions, we have help articles to walk you through DNS tasks, videos to explain different domain tasks, and our award-winning Wurk Guides are just a chat or call away.
Need help? Find help in our knowledgebase or simply chat to us .
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