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How to Add Domains

Validated on 31 May 2023 · Last edited on 10 Oct 2023

Adding a domain you own to your DigitalOcean account lets you manage the domain’s DNS records with the control panel and API. Domains you manage on DigitalOcean also integrate with DigitalOcean Load Balancers and Spaces to streamline automatic SSL certificate management.

Adding a domain to your project allows you to assign the domain to Droplets, load balancers, and other resources. You can only add domains with known top-level domains (TLDs) publicly recognized by ICANN.

Add a Domain Using Automation

To add a domain via the command-line, follow these steps:

  1. Install doctl, the DigitalOcean command-line tool.
  2. Create a personal access token, and save it for use with doctl.
  3. Use the token to grant doctl access to your DigitalOcean account.
    doctl auth init
  4. Finally, add a domain with doctl compute domain create. The basic usage looks like this, but you’ll want to read the usage docs for more details:
    doctl compute domain create <domain> [flags]

Add a Domain Using the Control Panel

To add a domain from the control panel, open the control panel, open the Create menu and click Domains/DNS.

The DigitalOcean control panel with the Create menu open and Domains/DNS highlighted.

This brings you to the Networking section’s Domains tab. Enter your domain into the Enter domain field, then click Add Domain. If your domain contains non-ASCII characters (such as accents or other Unicode characters), you must convert it to Punycode before adding it.

The system performs a DNS lookup to see if the domain has already been added to DigitalOcean. If it has, you’ll receive a message that says Data domain example.com : Name already exists. If the domain has not been previously added to DigitalOcean’s DNS service, it will be added. Domains you’ve added are listed on the Domains page.

The Networking section's Domains tab, showing the Add a domain form above a table of existing domains.

Once you’ve added a domain, click its name to view and modify its DNS records.

A domain's detail page, with the Create new record form above its list of DNS records.

You can add records in the Create a new record section. The DNS records section lists any existing records for the domain, and you can modify or delete records from the record’s More menu.