Domain parking serves a simple parked page for domains you’re not using yet — with automatic HTTPS, on our own infrastructure. Available on paid plans (see quotas); extra spots are available as an add-on.
1. Add the domain
On Dashboard → Domain parking, enter the domain and click Park domain. It appears in your list as pending DNS. Parked domains are encrypted at rest — we can look one up when it knocks on the door, but the list itself isn’t readable in bulk.
2. Point DNS at IP Cow
At your DNS provider, the domain must resolve directly to us — don’t proxy it through a CDN (e.g. an orange-cloud Cloudflare record), or certificate issuance will fail.
Root domain (example.com):
| Type | Name | Value |
|---|---|---|
| A | @ | 46.224.68.40 |
| AAAA | @ | 2a01:4f8:c015:a40a::1 |
If your provider supports ALIAS/ANAME records, you can use one pointing at park.ipcow.com
instead of the raw IPs.
Subdomain (www.example.com):
| Type | Name | Value |
|---|---|---|
| CNAME | www | park.ipcow.com |
3. Visit the domain once
Once DNS has propagated (usually minutes, occasionally up to a day), open
https://your-domain.com in a browser. On that first visit we request a certificate from
Let’s Encrypt and start serving the parked page — allow ~30 seconds. Your dashboard status flips
from pending DNS to active.
That’s it. Renewals are automatic; there’s nothing to maintain.
Troubleshooting
- Certificate error / connection refused on first visit — DNS hasn’t propagated yet, or the record points somewhere else. Check with the DNS Lookup tool: the A/AAAA answer must be exactly our IPs above.
- Domain uses CAA records — add (or confirm) a CAA record allowing
letsencrypt.orgto issue, e.g.example.com. CAA 0 issue "letsencrypt.org". Check with the CAA tool. - Stuck on “pending DNS” — the status flips on the first HTTPS visit, not on the DNS change itself. If DNS is correct, just open the domain in a browser.
- Proxied DNS (orange cloud) — turn the proxy off for this record (“DNS only”). The certificate is issued by validating that the domain reaches us; a proxy in front breaks that.
- Only domains you’ve added are served. Pointing a domain at us without parking it in the dashboard first does nothing — issuance is refused for unknown domains.
Removing a domain
Remove in the dashboard frees the spot immediately. Also delete the DNS records at your provider — a removed domain that still points at us will show a certificate error to visitors.