DNS Zones and Records

Cloudflare DNS starts with a zone: one domain managed by Cloudflare nameservers. Inside the zone, records tell browsers and mail servers where to send traffic.

Record	Purpose
`A`	Maps a name to an IPv4 address
`AAAA`	Maps a name to an IPv6 address
`CNAME`	Aliases one hostname to another
`MX`	Routes email for a domain
`TXT`	Stores verification and policy values

example.com.     A      203.0.113.10
www.example.com. CNAME  example.com.
example.com.     TXT    "v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com ~all"

TIP

For web apps, expect at least one root record (example.com) and often one www record.

TTL controls how long resolvers can cache a record. Lower TTL helps during migrations, but Cloudflare proxied records often hide origin changes behind the proxy.

Further Learning

“Cloudflare DNS records” — official record type docs
“dig command DNS lookup” — terminal verification
“DNS propagation explained” — why changes are not always instant

DNS Zones and Records

When you add your domain to Cloudflare, it becomes a zone — one domain that Cloudflare now manages the DNS for. Inside that zone, you add records that tell the internet where different things live.

The records you’ll actually use

Record	What it does
`A`	Points a name to a server’s address (e.g. `example.com → 203.0.113.10`)
`CNAME`	Points a name to another name (an alias, e.g. `www` → the root domain)
`MX`	Where email for your domain goes
`TXT`	Free-text, often used to prove domain ownership

example.com.     A      203.0.113.10
www.example.com. CNAME  example.com.

For a typical website, you’ll mostly touch the root A record and a www CNAME.

Changes take a moment to spread

TIP

After changing a DNS record, it doesn’t update everywhere instantly — the TTL (time-to-live) controls how long the old value is cached elsewhere. Give it a little time before assuming something’s broken.

In one sentence

A Cloudflare zone is your domain’s DNS home — set an A record to point to your server and a CNAME for www, and remember changes take a little time to fully propagate.

Want to go deeper?

Switch to Expert mode above for the full record type list and using dig to verify DNS.