Hi! I’ve been using netlify for quite a while, and recently started looking into optimizing the SEO. And I see that my website has more than 200 ms of TTFB, which seems unusual. While another site also running on netlify it loads initial bytes instantly.
Now I’ve read up that using apex domains is bad for CDN. Does it mean that it doesn’t work at all right now?
My site is https://bitcartcc.com
Also https://blog.bitcartcc.com is not on apex domain but also has similar issues maybe? It uses a CNAME record
I am using namecheap as my DNS provider, I set up 2 DNS records:
In netlify settings apex domain is the primary one and www is redirecting to the primary one.
I’ve got totally confused about this www versus no www issue. Is it true that right now CDN is not used for my site? How do I make it work? For example https://nuxtjs.org seems to work correctly.
Hey @MrNaif2018
The issue is with the ALIAS type records you have set up
As per Configure external DNS for a custom domain | Netlify Docs for the apex domain
Add an ALIAS , ANAME , or flattened CNAME record . Depending on your provider, leave the host field empty or enter @
Point the record to Netlify’s load balancer at: apex-loadbalancer.netlify.com
OR
Add an A record . Depending on your provider, leave the host field empty or enter @ .
Point the record to Netlify’s load balancer IP address: 75.2.60.5
and the www add a CNAME record with the value bitcartcc.netlify.app. .
I see! It seems to have improved. I am testing with GTMetrix and from my browser.
https://gtmetrix.com/reports/bitcartcc.com/U6On1e5U/
https://gtmetrix.com/reports/bitcartcc.com/5FXOGm0k/
The TTFB is varying from < 100 ms to 200+ ms, I guess it’s okay?
Also, now that I’ve set up my DNS record to the apex balance, is netlify CDN leveraged, or not really?
Because in the docs it tells: In both cases, the apex domain eventually resolves to our load balancer IP address. This means the apex domain can’t take advantage of direct DNS routing on a global CDN like Netlify’s
And then says…
Because of this, we recommend using a subdomain for your primary domain when using external DNS.
In other words, set www.bitcartcc.com as the primary domain not bitcartcc.com. If you want to use bitcartcc.com as the primary domain, your are advised to use Netlify DNS.
