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Overview

Cyclic apps are given random subdomain names at first deployment. The general structure of a name is -

some-random-words.cyclic.app

You can customize this domain in two ways:

Change the subdomain​

To change the subdomain to something like myproject.cyclic.app, navigate to Environments and use the form in the Custom Subdomain panel. You will be able to select a any custom domain that hasn't already been used.

Add a domain you own to an app​

You can attach a domain you own to a Cyclic app. This requires you to create two DNS records. The first record - to verify that you own the domain so that Cyclic can request the issue of an SSL certificate. The certificates are signed by AWS and are auto-renewed as long as appropriate DNS records exist. The second record, to route requests between your domain and cyclic app.

CAA Record

Since Cyclic delegates the issue of the SSL certificate to Amazon AWS, your DNS must allow AWS to create certs for your domain. A Certification Authority Authorization (CAA) record is used to specify which certificate authorities (CAs) are allowed to issue certificates for a domain.

For the validation to succeed, your DNS configuration must either not have any CAA records specified (allows all CA's) or include a CAA record with a value amazon.com or amazonaws.com. Refer to AWS docs for more info.

  1. Request a domain on the dashboard Advanced > Custom Domains panel.

  2. You will receive two DNS records to add to your registrar

    1. CNAME validation record that will look something like this:
    Record Name:  _xxxxxxxxxxx.your-domain.com
    Record Value: _yyyyyyyyyyy_.abcdef.acm-validations.aws

    This record is used to verify domain ownership and issue an SSL certificate for myproject.your-domain.com

    1. CNAME record to point your domain at your cyclic app, something like this:
    Record Name:  myproject.your-domain.com (the domain you requested) 
    Record Value: some-random-words.cyclic.app

    This record will route traffic from your domain to your app.

Once you add the records, it will take between 2 minutes to 24 hours for the domain to be live as DNS changes take time to propagate.

Apex Domains

A domain apex is the "root" level of your domain. your-domain.com is the "root" level, while www.your-domain.com or abc.your-domain.com are both subdomains.

Your registrar may not support CNAME records at apex. Many registrars support forwarding. A common practice is to register a www subdomain and forward apex to it.

Set up with your domain registrar​

Cloudflare​

GoDaddy​

Namecheap​

Additional support​

Reach out to us for any additional support on Discord