I use AWS for a number of different functions on my domain nowpresent.co and nowpresent.com. My website is hosted on Netlify at nowpresent.co, www.nowpresent.co, nowpresent.com and www.nowpresent.com. In order for the netlify aliases to resolve I have had to set my AWS R53 Registered Domains NS records to *.nsone.net.
I need to use AWS NameServers (eg. ns-X.awsdns-Y.com) for managing other services and functions that are internal to AWS. I cannot do this if the NS records are in Netlify.
What are the steps for me to use AWS NS records for A, CNAME etc. but still be able to route to netlify’s alias-based hosting? The documentation I found is this: Configure external DNS for a custom domain | Netlify Docs. In this it says “Point the record to Netlify’s load balancer IP address: 75.2.60.5.”.
I tried this previously and had issues getting all the different domains to resolve. Additionally I could not get LetsEncrypt to work to provide SSL Certificates. The only way I could get everything to work was to use the Netlify NS, and add my DNS records there.
Any clear suggestions on how to allow AWS R53 NameServers to be used by default would be greatly appreciated.
Hi! Netlify hosting uses an “alias A-record” such as subtle-axolotl-44c5d1.netlify.app, rather than an IP-based target. I can’t add this value as a CNAME or A-record in my R53 records. This is what I mean by “alias-based routing”. Maybe I’m using the wrong terminology?
I don’t know why you cannot add that. A and CNAME records are available to add in more or less all DNS providers. Maybe you need to reach out to AWS Support to ask them how to add these records?
Hi @hrishikesh AWS R53’s configuration is “An alias record can only redirect queries to selected AWS resources”. See documentation here
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I cannot create a naked / apex record with a CNAME. So I cannot have nowpresent.co with a CNAME to your alias value.
Does this make sense? Happy to get on a google-meet call and talk through it if that helps.
If AWS doesn’t support ALIAS record to point externally, that’s an AWS limitation, but Netlify supports using A records so it sounds like you can get around that limitation easily?
I’m sorry, but I’m not sure I am understanding the problem here. All you need is to configure a single A record and a single CNAME record. A lot of folks use AWS DNS and connect their domain to Netlify, so it’s definitely supported.
Hi @hrishikesh A records must be IP addresses. As I understand it, Netlify does not have static IP addresses for routing to domains. The address I used previously, as stated in the original post, was “75.2.60.5”, but this does not work for routing multiple domains.
When you say “configure a single A record and a single CNAME record” please could you be explicit about what the A and CNAME records should be? I have tried to do this, and have had problems, which is why I’m raising the issue here.
Again, it’s possible I’m missing something in how Netlify’s routing works, and AWS’s limitations affects this. I’d be grateful for a detailed example so that I can understand what to do.