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Connect your own domain

Serving your community from a domain you own: the exact DNS records, how long it takes, and what happens to your Drry address.

6 min readUpdated
  • funnels
  • setup
  • permanent

Instead of you.drry.com, your community can live at community.yoursite.com or at a domain you own outright.

This needs the Creator plan or higher, and only the community owner can do it. Even an admin on a paid plan is refused, because a domain is closer to owning the business than to running the community.

It is in Settings, in the card called Use your own domain.

  1. Type your domain and press Add

    Use the exact address you want, for example community.yoursite.com.

  2. Add the DNS records at your registrar

    Drry shows you exactly what to add, with a copy button on each value. Which one you need depends on the shape of your domain.

    For a subdomain like community.yoursite.com, add a CNAME record with the name community pointing at cname.drry.com.

    For a root domain like yoursite.com, add an A record with the name @ pointing at 76.76.21.21.

    You add these where you bought the domain: GoDaddy, Namecheap, Cloudflare, Google Domains. Not in Drry.

  3. Wait

    The card checks every fifteen seconds by itself, and there is a Check status button if you are impatient.

    DNS changes can take up to an hour to spread, sometimes longer. There is nothing to do during that time.

  4. Wait for Verified

    The badge turns green and reads Verified, and you get an email confirming your community is live on the new domain.

    The certificate that gives you the padlock is set up automatically. There is nothing to buy or configure.

Do not own a domain yet? Get a free .com

If you pay full price for Creator or Growth, Drry will register a .com for you and set it up. It is free, and it renews free while your community stays on a full-price Creator or Growth plan. You get one per account, for life. It belongs to you, not to one community, so every community you own can use it.

Only the community owner can get it. It is the top card in Settings, then Domains, called Get a free .com. If you are on Free, the card shows it as something that comes with Creator.

  1. Search for a name

    Type the name you want, such as yourname.com. Only standard priced .com names are offered, so a taken name, a premium name or a name that uses a big brand's name shows as unavailable. Under the search box you also get ideas built from your community name.

  2. Read the terms and confirm

    A short drawer sums up the terms before you commit: what Drry holds, what you can take, and what happens if you leave the plan. Each part is explained below. The full text is in the domains section of the Terms.

  3. Wait for it to register

    It is usually a minute or two. You can leave the page, and we email you when it is ready.

  4. Connect it

    When the card says it is yours, connect it to your community in the Use your own domain card just below. It is prefilled, and because Drry manages the records for a .com it bought you, there is nothing to add at a registrar.

Using it on more than one community

Every community you own shows the same .com card in Settings, then Domains, and the owner can manage it from any of them: its renewal, taking it with you, and its DNS records. Each community puts its own website on it. One community can use the .com itself, such as yourname.com. Another then uses a subdomain, such as community.yourname.com, and the card tells you so. Each community has one website domain.

On the Growth plan, the card also offers Send your community emails from an address on the domain, with a Set it up button. Each community gets its own sending address, and the card shows it. The community's website has to be on the .com, or a subdomain of it, first. See Send from your own domain.

Using the .com is optional: Use a domain from elsewhere sits beside it. Deleting a community leaves the .com with you while you still own another one. If you delete your last community, Drry keeps it registered until it lapses, so take it with you first.

Who owns it, and how to take it with you

  • Drry is the registrant. Drry registers the domain in its own name so it can set it up and keep it running. It is yours to use for your community while you are on Creator or Growth.

  • After 12 months in a row on a full-price Creator or Growth plan, you can move it to any domain company and register it in your own name, free.

  • Before that, you can take it early by paying for the months you have left, never more than $150. The exact amount is shown in your settings.

  • If you move to the free plan, your domain sends visitors to your Drry address until you upgrade again, and Drry will not renew it. If you had already finished your 12 months, you must move it out of Drry by the date shown in your settings, which is at most 30 days away, or it will expire.

  • A new registration cannot be moved for the first 60 days. That is a rule of the .com registry, not of Drry.

Common questions

Can I use both www and the root domain?

One domain per community, and Drry does not set up a redirect between www and the root. If you want both to work, add a redirect at your registrar.

How do I change to a different domain?

Remove the current one and add the new one. There is no edit. Removing does not touch the records at your registrar, so tidy those up yourself.

What happens if I downgrade to free?

Your custom domain starts redirecting to your Drry address within about a minute, and your community keeps working there. Nothing is deleted, and upgrading restores it with no DNS work.

Can I point a domain at a single funnel page?

No. The domain serves your whole community, and your home page decides what a visitor lands on.

Does a .com I got from Drry work any differently?

Yes, in two ways. Drry manages its DNS records for you, so you do not add anything at a registrar. And on the free plan it redirects to your Drry address instead of serving your community. See the section above.

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