DNS (Domain Name System)

DNS (Domain Name System) is the internet's directory that translates human-friendly domain names such as example.com into the numeric IP addresses computers use to find each other. Without DNS, people would have to remember IP addresses for every website.

When you visit a site, your device asks a DNS resolver, which looks up the answer through root, top-level-domain and authoritative name servers and caches it. DNS records hold different data: A and AAAA records map names to IPv4 and IPv6 addresses, CNAME creates aliases, MX points to mail servers and TXT holds verification text.