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Your own domain

Put your site on your own web address

Every LeagueRoots site starts at an address like yourleague.leagueroots.com. If your organization already owns a domain, such as yourleague.org, your site can use it instead. HTTPS (the padlock) is included, set up for you and renewed automatically.

Before you start

What you need

  • A domain your organization owns. If you do not have one, you can buy one from any domain registrar, usually for a few dollars a month.
  • A sign-in to the place that manages its DNS. That is usually the company you bought the domain from. Look for a page called DNS, DNS records, Zone editor or Advanced DNS. If someone else set the domain up, ask them for access or send them this page.
  • Ten minutes. You will add or change two records. You do not change your nameservers, and email on the domain keeps working.

How it works

Four steps, two of them ours

  1. Tell us the addresses

    Let us know which addresses you want, usually both yourleague.org and www.yourleague.org. We add them to your site and confirm the records below.

  2. Create two DNS records

    At your DNS provider, as shown in the table below. This is the only part you do.

  3. We check, then secure it

    Our server checks your records every few minutes. As soon as they point at us it gets your site's HTTPS certificate on its own, usually within minutes.

  4. We switch you over

    We make your domain the main address. Links to your old leagueroots.com address keep working and forward to the new one.

Step 2

The DNS records

Replace yourleague with your own names. We send you the exact values when we add your domain.

For this address Type Name (or Host) Value (or Points to, Target)
www.yourleague.org CNAME www yourleague.leagueroots.com
yourleague.org A @ (some providers leave it blank, or want the whole domain) 66.226.73.154

Clear out anything in the way

Each of those two names should have only the record above. If your provider already has others for the same name, such as an old website, a parking page or a "coming soon" page, delete them, including any AAAA (IPv6) records. One leftover record is enough to send some visitors, and the check for your certificate, to the wrong place.

Leave everything else alone: MX and TXT records are your email and other services, and nothing here touches them.

If your provider offers ALIAS or ANAME

Some DNS providers let the bare domain (@) point at a name instead of an IP address; they call it ALIAS, ANAME or CNAME flattening. If yours does, you can use it for yourleague.org with the value yourleague.leagueroots.com instead of the A record. Either works.

If you only want one address

You can use just www.yourleague.org (the CNAME) or just yourleague.org (the A record). Most organizations set up both, so people reach the site whichever way they type it.

Questions

If something does not look right

How long does it take?

Usually under an hour from when you save the records. DNS changes can take up to 48 hours to reach everywhere, most often because the old records were set to be remembered for a long time. Nothing breaks while you wait: your leagueroots.com address keeps working throughout.

My provider will not let me create a CNAME for the bare domain

That is normal: the bare domain (@) cannot hold a CNAME anywhere. Use the A record for it, as in the table, and the CNAME only for www.

My provider added a dot, or the whole domain, to what I typed

That is fine. yourleague.leagueroots.com. with a trailing dot means the same thing, and many providers show the name as www.yourleague.org even though you typed www.

My DNS provider has a proxy, CDN or "protect this site" switch

Turn it off for these two records, so they point straight at us (often shown as "DNS only"). With it on, our server cannot confirm the records or get your certificate.

What happens to our old website?

Once the records point at LeagueRoots, visitors to your domain see your LeagueRoots site, and your old site stops being reachable at that address. Copy anything you want to keep across first.

How can I check the records myself?

Search for any "DNS lookup" tool and look up your address: an A lookup for yourleague.org should show only 66.226.73.154, and www.yourleague.org should show a CNAME to yourleague.leagueroots.com. We can see the same thing, so you are also welcome to just ask us.

Does it cost anything?

Not from us. The certificate and the setup are included. You keep paying your registrar for the domain as you do now.

Ready, or stuck? Get in touch and tell us your organization and the addresses you want.

Ready for a calmer registration season?

Tell us about your community organization and we will set you up, walk your board through it and help you open registration. There is nothing to pay until families register.

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