DNS records are sets of instructions that live on DNS servers. These instructions are vital to the success of a DNS lookup.
DNS records (aka zone files) are instructions that live in authoritative DNS servers and provide information about a domain including what IP address is associated with that domain and how to handle requests for that domain. These records consist of a series of text files written in what is known as DNS syntax. DNS syntax is just a string of characters used as commands that tell the DNS server what to do. All DNS records also have a ‘TTL’, which stands for time-to-live, and indicates how often a DNS server will refresh that record.
You can think of a set of DNS records like a business listing on Yelp. That listing will give you a bunch of useful information about a business such as their location, hours, services offered, etc. All domains are required to have at least a few essential DNS records for a user to be able to access their website using a domain name, and there are several optional records that serve additional purposes.
Cloudflare DNS supports a wide variety of DNS records. Learn about Cloudflare's authoritative DNS service, or about managing DNS records in Cloudflare.
After reading this article you will be able to:
DNS A Record
DNS MX Record
What is DNS?
DNS Root Server
DNS Server Types
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