Getting started

This guide takes you from an empty account to a working redirect. Before you start, make sure you own or manage the domain you want to redirect and can change its DNS. Not sure? Read Is redirect.pizza for me?

Step 1: Create an account

Create a free account. No credit card required.

Step 2: Add your redirect

Enter the hostname you want to redirect in the Source URL field and the address it should go to as the destination. In this example we redirect redirect-pizza-example.xyz, a domain registered at GoDaddy.

We recommend adding both the apex (non-www) and the www hostname as separate sources, so visitors land in the right place no matter which one they type. Read why in Redirecting non-www to www.

By default, redirect.pizza creates a permanent 301 redirect and provisions an SSL certificate for the hostname. You can switch to a 302, 307, 308, frame or meta refresh redirect in the redirect settings.

Adding a source URL and destination to a new redirect

After saving, the hostname shows a DNS status of "checking": the detected DNS records don't match the required ones yet.

DNS status showing the detected and required values before the change

Step 3: Change the DNS

Add the required records at your DNS provider. That's usually your domain registrar, unless you use external nameservers such as Cloudflare. The exact records are listed under Hostnames in your account, and What are these DNS changes? explains what they do.

We have step-by-step walkthroughs for popular providers:

You'll find the full list on the support page. If your provider isn't listed, its support team can usually make the change for you when you share the required records. On the Pro plan and up, automatic DNS applies the records for you.

Step 4: Wait for the DNS to propagate

DNS changes take up to 24 hours to propagate, although it's usually much faster. You can follow the progress with a tool like WhatsMyDNS.

redirect.pizza keeps checking in the background. Once the records are detected, the hostname gets a green checkmark and we request the SSL certificate. Something not working as expected? See Troubleshooting new redirects.

Step 5: Done

Green checkmark? Traffic is now flowing through redirect.pizza, over both HTTP and HTTPS. Follow the results in your analytics.

Redirect verified with a green checkmark on all DNS records

Related guides

More articles

Setup & Configuration
What are these DNS changes?
What DNS types can I use?
How long does the DNS change take?
Troubleshooting new redirects
Redirecting non-www to www
Redirect settings
Matching
Regex matching
Wildcard subdomains
Destination variables
Dynamic destinations
Redirect flattening
SSL profiles
robots.txt
Monitoring redirect.pizza itself