How to Register a Domain Name and Connect It to Your Astro Site

Your host gives you a free address, like yoursite.pages.dev. It works. But a real name, like yoursite.com, is the one thing on an Astro site worth paying for. Here’s how to buy one and connect it. We did this for astrobeginner.com.

Step 1: Pick a name

Short beats clever. Easy to say out loud beats easy to read. If you’d have to spell it on the phone, pick another.

Stick with .com if you can get it. People type it by habit. If your .com is taken, .co, .dev or your country’s ending are fine. Avoid endings nobody has heard of.

Step 2: Check the renewal price

Every seller shows a first-year price. Look for the renewal price, the one you’ll pay every year after. On November 8, 2026, Porkbun listed .com at $11.81 a year with the same price on renewal. Cloudflare Registrar sells domains at cost, with no markup. Some big-name sellers show $1 for year one and about $20 a year after that.

Also check that privacy protection is included. Without it, your home address is published in a public record.

Step 3: Buy it

Make an account, search the name, pay. You’ll get an email. Keep it. It has the login you’ll need once a year.

Step 4: Connect it to your host

There are two ways, and the host tells you which it wants.

The nameserver way. The host gives you two names, like chuck.ns.cloudflare.com. At your registrar, find Nameservers, choose Custom, paste both, save. This hands all the domain’s settings to the host. It’s what we did for astrobeginner.com, and it’s the simplest to manage later.

The DNS record way. The host gives you one or two records to add at your registrar, usually a CNAME pointing www at the host, and an A record or ALIAS for the bare name. At your registrar, find DNS and add exactly what the host shows.

Here’s where each host hides this:

Host	Where to add your domain
Cloudflare	Add the site to your Cloudflare account, then in the Worker, Settings, Domains & Routes, add the domain.
Netlify	Domain management, Add a domain. Netlify offers its nameservers, or shows you records.
GitHub Pages	Repository Settings, Pages, Custom domain. GitHub shows the records to add.

Step 5: Make www and the bare name agree

Decide on one. We use astrobeginner.com without www. Then set the other one to redirect to it, so both work and Google sees one site. Cloudflare does this with one redirect rule. Netlify does it in Domain management by setting a primary domain.

Step 6: Check it

Type the name in a browser. You should see your site with a padlock in the address bar. The padlock is HTTPS, and every host above sets it up for you for free. If it says “not secure” for the first few minutes, wait. Certificates take a moment.

Where to go next

• Domain name vs web hosting, if you want the why behind the how.
• How to change your domain later without losing rankings.
• Deploy to Cloudflare Workers, the host we use.

Frequently asked questions

Where should I buy a domain?

Anywhere honest about the renewal price. We like Cloudflare Registrar, which sells at cost, and Porkbun, which includes privacy. Avoid anyone whose year-two price is double year one.

Do I need to buy privacy protection?

Check whether it's included. Cloudflare and Porkbun include it. Some sellers charge extra for it. Without it, your name and address are public.

How long until the domain works?

Usually a few minutes. Sometimes a few hours. Nameserver changes can take up to a day in rare cases.