Knowledgebase
DNS & Nameservers Explained
What DNS and nameservers do, the record types behind them, and why changes take time to go live.
What is DNS?
DNS (the Domain Name System) is the internet's address book. Every device on the internet is ultimately reached by a numeric IP address, but people don't…
What is a nameserver?
A nameserver is a specific server that answers DNS questions for a domain. It's the piece of infrastructure that actually holds and serves a domain's DNS…
DNS record types, explained
A domain's nameservers hold a set of DNS records: individual instructions, each of a specific type, that tell the internet what to do with different kinds…
What is a DNS zone file?
A zone file is the container that holds all of a domain's DNS records together as one set. Every A record, MX record, TXT record, and so on for that…
What is DNSSEC and why does it matter?
DNSSEC (Domain System Security Extensions) adds a layer of cryptographic verification to DNS, so a resolver can confirm that the DNS answer it received…
Public DNS vs. authoritative DNS
These two roles get confused constantly, and the distinction matters: Authoritative DNS is the source of truth for a domain: the nameservers (What Is a…
Why DNS changes take time to go live
A DNS record change isn't instant everywhere, because of how caching works across the recursive resolvers described in Public DNS vs. Authoritative DNS.…
Custom Nameservers vs. NameBright's Default Nameservers
Every domain has to point at a set of nameservers, and you have two options: use the default nameservers NameBright assigns automatically, or point the…
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