Alright, you have installed WordPress in Amazon Lightsail with a few mouse clicks. We can already access the fresh installation with the provided IP address. Now, the next step is to local this IP address and point a domain to it. That will allow the WordPress website to be accessible globally with a domain like a .com or .xyz. This post will teach you to configure the DNS for a domain name to point to a Lightsail Instance. You can also implement Cloudflare so that the Domain’s DNS actually points to Cloudflare and Cloudflare points to your IP at the Amazon Web Server.
First, lock a static IP.
- Go to the Amazon Lightsail dashboard.
- Click on the Networking tab link.
- Click on Create static IP.
- Under Attach to instance, select your WordPress Instance.
- Give your Static IP a name under Identify your IP.
- Hit Create at the end.
A new IP address might be assigned to you. That IP will point to your WordPress instance. It will remain the same now. The IP address is how the WordPress instance can be accessed publicly.
The next thing to do is to point your domain to this IP address.
It can be done via various methods. You can use your domain registrars DNS services to point to this IP. You can also use Amazon’s DNS service to point to it. Or you can use an external provider like Cloudflare.
The DNS of your domain registrar should be pointed in the following method
A Record
@.yourdomain.com points to IP like 34.198.233.4
CName
www is an alias of yourdomain.com
OR
CName
www.yourdomain.com maps to yourdomain.com
The Screenshots will further clarify it
Amazon DNS Zone
Under DNS Zones in Amazon AWS.
Don’t forget to point your nameservers to those provided by Amazon. You have to click on Create DNS Zone first to create it first.
CloudFlare DNS
Under DNS in CloudFlare
After your domain is pointed to CloudFlare’s DNS correctly, use the following screenshot as a guide.
Your Registrar’s DNS
The final option is to use your registrars DNS. It means that your domain name is pointing to your domain name registrars name servers. After that use the following screenshot from GoDaddy as a guide.
