Use your own nameservers (Route 53, Hetzner and others)

You can host the DNS of a domain at any DNS provider (Amazon Route 53, Hetzner, DigitalOcean, Bunny and others) and keep the domain registered with us.

Before you start. The registry only accepts nameservers that already answer for the domain. The zone must therefore exist at your provider first; we check that before anything is changed.

1. In your dashboard, open the domain and choose "Use my own nameservers".
2. Press "Download DNS records (zone file)". You get a zone file with your current A, AAAA, CNAME, MX and TXT records.
3. Create the zone for your domain at your provider and import the file, or add the records by hand.
4. Paste the nameservers your provider shows you, one per line (2 to 6), and press "Check nameservers". Every nameserver must answer for your domain.
5. Tick the confirmation and press "Switch to these nameservers". The change can take a few hours to spread.

Amazon Route 53, step by step

1. In the Route 53 console open Hosted zones and choose Create hosted zone. Enter the domain name and keep the type Public hosted zone.
2. Open the new zone and choose Import zone file. Paste the contents of the file you downloaded and import it.
3. The zone's NS record lists four name servers, for example ns-123.awsdns-45.com. Copy all four, without the dot at the end.
4. Paste them under "Use my own nameservers" on the domain's page here, check them and switch.

Good to know

• We do not copy records to your provider and cannot edit them afterwards. The records in our editor are no longer used after the switch.
• DNSSEC: with this change we switch DNSSEC off for the domain and remove our signing key, because the registry does not accept other nameservers while it is set. The domain keeps working, unsigned. For a .si domain, switching back to our DNS turns DNSSEC on again.
• Email forwarding, mailboxes and the one-click connections need DNS records: while you use your own nameservers we show you the records to add at your provider.
• Nameservers inside the domain itself (such as ns1.yourdomain.si) are not supported.
• For several domains, use "Apply these nameservers to other domains" on the domain's page. Each domain needs its own zone at your provider.
• "Switch back to our DNS" on the domain's page returns the domain to our DNS at any time.

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