:Record types

This document explains records that Alibaba Cloud DNS supports, including A records, CNAME records, NS records, MX records, AAAA records, SRV records, and TXT records.

Add a record

After adding a domain name to the Alibaba Cloud DNS, you can start configuring its DNS settings by adding a record. Follow these steps to go to the Add Record page (for example purposes, the domain name added is abc.com).

1. Log on to the Alibaba Cloud DNS console.

2. Go to the Basic DNS page, locate the domain name to be configured and, under the corresponding Actions column, click Configure.

3. Click Add Record.

   

A records

A records are used to point your domain name to an IP address. To add an A record on the Add Record page, the following information is required.

• Record type: A.
• Host: the subdomain name. For example,
  • To add the resolution for www.abc.com, enter www in the host field.
  • To resolve abc.com, leave the host field empty and the system will put an @ in the field automatically.
• ISP Line: required. If not specified, some users may fail to resolve the domain name.
• Value: the IP address. Only the IPv4 address is allowed.
• TTL: optional. The system automatically generates a value, 600 seconds by default. TTL is the cache time. The smaller the value, the faster the modified records take effect in various regions.

CNAME records

CNAME records are used to redirect your domain name to another domain name, which has a record pointing to the expected IP address. To add a CNAME record on the Add Record page, the following information is required.

• Record type: CNAME.
• Host: the subdomain name. For example,
  • To add the resolution for www.abc.com, enter www in the host field.
  • To resolve abc.com, leave the host field empty. The system will put an @ in the field automatically. A CNAME record using @ as the host can affect the normal resolution of the MX records, therefore proceed with caution when performing this action.
• ISP Line: required. If not specified, some users may fail to resolve the domain name.
• Value: the domain name being pointed to.
• TTL: optional. The system automatically generates the value, which is 600 seconds by default. TTL indicates the cache time. The smaller the value, the faster the modified records take effect in various regions.

NS records

NS records are used to change the DNS service providers that resolve your subdomain name. To add an NS record on the Add Record page, the following information is required.

• Record type: NS.
• Host: the subdomain name. For example, to authorize other DNS servers to resolve the subdomain www.abc.com, enter www as the host.
  • The host record (RR value) of NS records cannot be empty, and the NS records do not support wildcard resolution (including multiple subdomain names in one record).
  • The subdomain names assigned to the management of other DNS provider do not affect the normal resolution of other subdomain names.
• ISP Line: required. If not specified, some users may fail to resolve the domain name.
• Value: the DNS domain names of the authorized DNS server, such as ns-alidns.com. We recommend that you add at least two DNS servers to guarantee service availability (for example, ns-alidns.com and ns-alidns.com).
• TTL: optional. The system automatically generates the value, which is 600 seconds by default. TTL indicates the cache time. The smaller the value, the faster the modified records take effect in various regions.

MX records

MX records are used to assign an email address for the domain name to receive emails. To add an MX record on the Add Record page, the following information is required.

• Record type: MX.
• Host: the subdomain name. Generally, the email address xxx@abc.com is used, and the host record is left empty. If the host record is entered as mail, the email address becomes xxx@mail.abc.com.
• ISP Line: required.
  • If not specified, some users may fail to resolve the domain name and emails may fail to be received.
  • MX records usually do not require intelligent resolution, so you can apply the default value.
• Value: the domain name provided to you by your email service provider. If you are using a self-built email server, you must have an email server domain name and the domain name must have A records.
• MX priority: required. The lower the MX priority value, the higher the priority level. MX priority is not required if there is only one MX record. If your domain name resolution records include multiple MX records:
  • The email sender server delivers emails to the server with the lowest MX priority value first.
  • If that server suffers a fault and cannot receive emails any more, the sender server automatically selects the next server with the lowest priority value among the other servers, until the email is delivered successfully. If all servers have failed, a sending failure error is returned.
• TTL: optional. The system automatically generates the value, which is 600 seconds by default. TTL indicates the cache time. The smaller the value, the faster the modified records take effect in various regions.

AAAA records

AAAA records are used to point your domain name to an IPv6 address. To add an AAAA record on the Add Record page, the following information is required.

• Record type: AAAA.
• Host: the subdomain name. For example,
  • To add the resolution for www.abc.com, enter www in the host field.
  • To resolve abc.com, leave the host field empty. The system will put an @ in the field automatically.
• ISP Line: required. If not specified, some users may fail to resolve the domain name.
• Value: the IP address. Only the IPv6 address is allowed.
• TTL: optional. The system automatically generates the value, which is 600 seconds by default. TTL indicates the cache time. The smaller the value, the faster the modified records take effect in various regions.

SRV records

SRV records are used to identify a service used by a server and record a service provided by a computer. To add a SRV record on the Add Record page, the following information is required.

• Record type: SRV.
• Host: the formatted string service name.protocol (for example, _example-server._tcp).
• ISP Line: required. If not specified, some users may fail to resolve the domain name.
• Value: the formatted string priority & space & weight & space & port number & space & target address (for example, 3 0 2176 example-server.-google.com).
• TTL: optional. The system automatically generates the value, which is 600 seconds by default. TTL indicates the cache time. The smaller the value, the faster the modified records take effect in various regions.

TXT records

TXT records are used to identify and describe the domain name. TXT records are generally applied to SPF records (anti-spam). To add a TXT record on the Add Record page, the following information is required.

• Record type: TXT.
• Host: the subdomain name. For example,
  • To add the resolution for www.abc.com, enter www in the host field.
  • To resolve abc.com, leave the host field empty. The system will put an @ in the field automatically.
• ISP Line: required.
  • If not specified, some users may fail to resolve the domain name.
  • TXT records do not require intelligent resolution and you can apply the default value.

• Value: any value you like (or left empty). When used as the SPF record (anti-spam), the most typical SPF-format TXT record is v=spf1amx~all, indicating only the IP addresses in the A records and MX records of this domain name are authorized to use this domain name to send emails.

• TTL: optional. The system automatically generates the value, which is 600 seconds by default. TTL indicates the cache time. The smaller the value, the faster the modified records take effect in various regions.