Adding a Custom Domain

By default, your AI Landing Pages are served on a Halda subdomain. Connecting a custom domain lets you serve them under your own brand (for example, info.youruniversity.edu). This article walks through the setup, the DNS records you'll add, and the most common mistakes to avoid.

The setup, step by step

The setup wizard guides you through five stages with a progress indicator:

1. Add domain — Enter the subdomain you want to use (e.g., landing.example.edu).
2. Provision infrastructure — We automatically set up secure hosting and request an SSL certificate for your domain. This typically takes a few minutes and updates on its own.
3. Configure DNS — Add the DNS records we provide (see below) at your DNS provider.
4. Waiting for DNS & SSL — We check that your records are live and that the security certificate is validated. This can take anywhere from a few minutes up to 48 hours, depending on your provider. You can click Verify to check at any time.
5. Active — Once DNS and SSL are both confirmed, your domain goes live.

The DNS records you'll add

The wizard shows you two CNAME records with the exact values to copy. Add both at your DNS provider:

Copy the Name and Value for each record exactly as shown in the wizard.

⚠️ Avoid these common mistakes

• Keep the trailing dot. The record name ends with a dot (e.g., landing.example.edu.). That dot marks it as a complete address. Some providers (GoDaddy is a known example) silently remove it, which causes your provider to append your domain to itself and breaks the record. Re-check after saving.
• Add both records. Skipping the second (SSL validation) CNAME will cause the certificate to never validate, and the domain will stay stuck in "waiting."
• Don't mix up the values. The routing CNAME and the SSL-validation CNAME have different values — paste each into its matching record.
• Use the exact subdomain. Add the record at the subdomain level shown (e.g., landing), not at your root domain.
• Give it time. If verification fails on the first try, that's normal — DNS changes can take time to propagate. Wait and click Verify again.

Status indicators

While setup completes, you'll see status badges:

• DNS: Pending → Verified (or "Not found" if records aren't detected yet)
• SSL: Pending → Provisioning → Active

When both are active, the domain becomes Active automatically.

Removing a custom domain

You can remove a custom domain at any time using Remove. We'll decommission the hosting and certificate behind the scenes; your pages remain available on the default Halda domain.