So you’ve purchased a domain and secured some hosting. Now what? Well, if the domain and hosting were purchased in two different locations, say Namecheap and SiteGround, you’ll need to point your domain to your host.
Why? Well because right now typing in your domain in a browser takes you to a temporary landing page. Your domain is not connected to your hosting account. Your site is essentially somewhere out there on the internet, but no one knows how to access it. That’s where the domain comes in. It allows people to actually pull up your website. And that only works if the two are linked.
But how do you actually point your domain to your host? It’s actually quite easy as long as you know what you’re looking for. In this tutorial, I’m going to be showing you how to point a Namecheap domain to SiteGround hosting, but keep in mind that the process will be similar for all domain registars and hosts.
Let’s get started!
First, sign into your SiteGround account and click on the red go to cPanel button. On your cPanel’s home screen you’ll see a list of 2 nameservers (on the top left side). Copy those or keep this window open (you’ll need it in a few minutes).
Sidenote: not using SiteGround? Login to your hosting account and you should be able to find your nameservers somewhere on your dashboard. You may have also received them in a welcome email. If all else fails, contact support and ask for the nameservers.
Next, login to your Namecheap account and navigate to Account > Domain List and select Manage next to your newly purchased domain. Note: this is usually the default page when you login.
Sidenote: Not using Namecheap? You’ll still want to look for a manage, settings, or edit page associated with your domain. For GoDaddy, it’s manage.
Scroll down to the nameservers section and on the dropdown with Namecheap BasicDNS, select Custom DNS.
Paste the 2 SiteGround nameservers (that you copied earlier) into the Custom DNS fields (one per line). Then click the green checkmark to save your changes.
Your domain is now pointing to your host! Keep in mind that it can take up to 72 hours for things to update and for your domain to actually point to your host. In my experience, this usually isn’t the case, but be aware that it can take that long.
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