A DNS change does not appear everywhere at once. Servers across the internet cache DNS answers, so a change rolls out gradually as those caches expire. Allow up to 48 hours for full propagation before judging the result.
What propagation actually is
When someone visits your site, their network asks a DNS resolver where your domain points. Resolvers keep the answer in a cache so they do not have to ask again for every visitor. When you change a record, resolvers still holding the old answer keep serving it until their copy expires. Different resolvers expire at different times, which is why one person sees the new site while another still sees the old one.
The 48 hour window
Our Terms of Use state the figure plainly: DNS propagation can take up to 48 hours. During that window:
- some visitors reach the new destination and some reach the old one;
- email routing can be split the same way if mail records changed;
- testing from one device proves nothing about the rest of the world.
Make one change, wait the window out, and only then evaluate. Stacking a second change on top of an unpropagated first one makes problems very hard to diagnose.
Making changes safely
You can edit your domain's nameservers from its page in the client portal. Before changing records you are not sure about, ask us first. And note the responsibility rule in section 6 of the Terms of Use: once credentials are handed over to you or your designee, changes you make to DNS are at your own risk, and fixing problems caused by changes we did not make is billable.
Planning a bigger move, like a registrar transfer or a new email setup? Transferring Your Domain to Another Registrar and Email That Delivers: SPF, DKIM and DMARC both come back to this same 48 hour window. If a change still looks stuck well past 48 hours, contact us and we will trace it.
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