# Wildcard SSL renewal failing — external DNS, please reissue standard cert

**URL:** <https://answers.netlify.com/t/wildcard-ssl-renewal-failing-external-dns-please-reissue-standard-cert/170313>\
**Category:** Support\
**Tags:** netlify-dns-https-ssl\
**Created:** [September 21, 2026, 7:11am UTC](https://answers.netlify.com/t/wildcard-ssl-renewal-failing-external-dns-please-reissue-standard-cert/170313 "2026-09-21T07:11:35Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![nat](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/netlify/user_avatar/answers.netlify.com/nat/32/83127_2.png) [@nat](https://answers.netlify.com/u/nat)\
**Post date:** [September 21, 2026, 7:11am UTC](https://answers.netlify.com/t/wildcard-ssl-renewal-failing-external-dns-please-reissue-standard-cert/170313/1 "2026-09-21T07:11:35Z")

</div>

My site: thawminds.netlify.app  
Custom domain: [thawminds.org](http://thawminds.org) (with [www.thawminds.org](http://www.thawminds.org))

My Let’s Encrypt certificate expired and won’t renew. Error shown:

`SniCertificate::CertificateValidationError: Unable to verify challenge for *.thawminds.org: DNS problem: NXDOMAIN looking up TXT for _acme-challenge.thawminds.org - check that a DNS record exists for this domain`

DNS is managed externally at IONOS, not Netlify DNS, so the automatic DNS-01 challenge for the wildcard certificate can’t be completed. I don’t need a wildcard certificate — I only use the root domain and [www](http://www).

Could you please remove the wildcard requirement and reissue a standard, non-wildcard Let’s Encrypt certificate for:

- [thawminds.org](http://thawminds.org)
- [www.thawminds.org](http://www.thawminds.org)

That should validate via HTTP-01 instead, which will work with my current DNS setup:

- A @ → 75.2.60.5
- CNAME www → thawminds.netlify.app

Thank you.