Quicken DNS Propagation for faster Website Migration

When migrating a website to a new server, the domain nameserver record need to be updated to the new web server DNS record.
The period of time it takes for the nameservers change (domain propagation) to take effect is proportional to the DNS TTL value.

What is DNS TTL

In computing, Time to live (TTL) defines the lifespan or lifetime of data in a computer or network. It’s sort of like a caching mechanism.

DNS TTL dictates how long it will be until your computer refreshes its DNS related information.
The DNS entry is stored at various levels (browser, OS, proxy server, DNS servers, etc) and is cached for a specific period depending on the TTL value.

Effect of DNS TTL on Site Migration

Assuming you’ succeeded in moving your site and also updated the DNS nameserver to point to your new webhost.
Visitors to your site and even you might still be seeing the site on the old server.
The reason for this is – say your DNS TTL is set to 86400 (24 hrs), the web browser still have a cache copy of the TTL and the DNS will only be updated after 24 hrs.

Reducing the TTL to a much more lower value (say 300 secs) help quickens domain propagation.

The TTL should be set to the 300secs a preferably day before the planned migration date so that site visitors would have the updated TTL cached to their computer.

Finally, when the nameserver is updated, it would take just 5mins (300s) for the domain to propagate thus quickening the migration process.

How to set DNS TTL

A lot of shared hosting include with cPanel for server administration. I am assuming your host has it.

  1. Login to cPanel
  2. Click Advanced DNS Zone Editor under Domains widget.

    Advanced DNS Zone Editor - cPanel

  3. Select the domain name from the dropdown.
  4. In the Zone File Records section, click the edit link beside the domain under the Action column.
  5. Enter the new TTL value in the TTL input form field and save.
    cPanel's DNS Zone File Records

During website migration, the TTL change should be done in the old hosting and not the new one.

Make sure to change the TTL value to at least 24hrs (86400s) in order to reduce the load on your host nameservers.

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