Table of Contents

Configuring your domain for SquareSpace

So you have created a website with SquareSpace and now need to configure your domain name at Gandi so that it takes visitors to your webstore.

Step 1: Log into your domain name

You will need to log into your domain name with any of the contacts (other than the billing contact) (trouble logging in?).

Step 2: Change your zone file

First, make an editable copy of your zone file.

Then, you will need to make the changes that will point your domain to your Squarespace website. You can do this by editing (or adding) the CNAME record for the www subdomain to point to ext-cust.squarespace.com (or another value they give you).

It will look something like this: 

www 10800 IN CNAME ext-cust.squarespace.com.

You will also want the bare domain to point at the same website, so you must add or replace the A record(s) for the bare domain, which will look like this (remember to replace the IP in the example with the SquareSpace's IP address that they give you if necessary): 

@ 10800 IN A 198.49.23.144
@ 10800 IN A 198.49.23.145
@ 10800 IN A 198.185.159.144
@ 10800 IN A 198.185.159.145

When launching the process on Squarespace's interface, they will give you a verification code and CNAME entry that you need to make in order to validate your domain. Please do not forget to add that to your zone file as well. In expert mode it will look something like:

163hg4jghj32g3342 10800 IN CNAME verify.squarespace.com.

(though with the code that they provided to you)

Example of a zone

Here is an example of a zone file for a domain (we'll use example.com) that will bring visitors to a SquareSpace website: 

www 10800 IN CNAME ext-cust.squarespace.com.
@ 10800 IN A 198.49.23.144
@ 10800 IN A 198.49.23.145
@ 10800 IN A 198.185.159.144
@ 10800 IN A 198.185.159.145
163hg4jghj32g3342 10800 IN CNAME verify.squarespace.com.
imap 10800 IN CNAME access.mail.gandi.net. 
smtp 10800 IN CNAME relay.mail.gandi.net. 
webmail 10800 IN CNAME agent.mail.gandi.net. 
blog 10800 IN CNAME blogs.vip.gandi.net. 
pop 10800 IN CNAME access.mail.gandi.net.
@ 10800 IN MX 50 fb.mail.gandi.net. 
@ 10800 IN MX 10 spool.mail.gandi.net. 
@ 10800 IN TXT "v=spf1 include:_mailcust.gandi.net ?all"

After you submit your new zone file, please be sure to wait a couple of hours for the zone to be updated with the new information, as the changes are not seen immediately.

Step 3

After having finished configuring your domain for your webstore, you will need to make some technical changes in your SquareSpace account (namely, attaching your domain to your webstore). For security purposes, Gandi cannot perform these changes for you.