Understand domains
Learn the fundamentals of working with domains on Netlify.
A domain name is the URL or web address where visitors find your site.
To access your deploys on Netlify, you can set up a custom domain or use the default Netlify subdomain.
# Supported custom domains
Custom domains allow you to make your sites accessible at your own domain names, such as www.yourcustomdomain.com or docs.example.dev. All top-level domains are supported for your custom domain.
Netlify supports custom domains for your production site, Deploy Previews, and branch deploys.
- For your production site, Netlify supports a primary site domain, domain aliases, and domain-based redirects.
- For Deploy Previews, you can customize your domain after the Deploy Preview prefix
deploy-preview-#with an automatic deploy subdomain. For example:deploy-preview-123.company.com. - For branch deploys, you can customize your domain after your branch name with automatic deploy subdomains or branch subdomains.
For example: branch-name.company.com
For more example custom domains, check out the chart below.
# Default Netlify subdomain
Unless you’ve set up a basic password protection or authentication, a production site/app on Netlify is accessible from its Netlify subdomain, which takes the form [name-of-your-site].netlify.app. Note that you can change the name of your site to change this Netlify subdomain.
For example, if your site is named brave-curie-12345, then by default your site is available at https://brave-curie-12345.netlify.app/.
Learn more about other types of default Netlify subdomains for other types of deploys in the chart below.
# Example domains for deploys
Your site deploys can have different domain patterns based on the type of site deploy.
# Custom domain examples
| Site deploy type | Custom domain | Use case |
|---|---|---|
| Production deploy | company.com | Can set a primary domain for your production site. |
| Deploy Preview | deploy-preview-42.early-access.company.com | Can set a custom domain for Deploy Previews with an automatic deploy subdomain. |
Branch deploy for a branch named staging | Branch subdomain: staging.company.com Automatic deploy subdomain: staging.early-access.company.com or staging.internal-events.com | Can set a custom domain for your branch deploys with an automatic deploy subdomain or branch subdomains. |
# Netlify subdomain examples
By default, your site deploys are available at a URL using the Netlify subdomain yoursitename.netlify.app. The Netlify subdomain URLs will always work even if you set up a custom domain for your site.
| Site deploy type | Netlify subdomain | Use case |
|---|---|---|
| Production deploy URL | yoursitename.netlify.app | Typically a placeholder URL, ideal for internal development before assigning a custom domain for site visitors. |
| Deploy Preview | deploy-preview-42--yoursitename.netlify.app | Unique URL for previewing and collaborating on each pull/merge request. |
Branch deploy for a branch named staging | staging--yoursitename.netlify.app Note: With a branch subdomain set up, the URL can be staging.yourcustomdomain.com. | Long-standing URL ideal for internal testing, QA teams, and ongoing development. To set up branch deploys, check out branch deploy controls. |
| Atomic deploy | 1234abcd12acde000111cdef--yoursitename.netlify.app | Unique URL for a specific successful deploy. Also called deploy permalinks or just permalinks. Unlike the other site deploys, the web content at this URL never changes. A new deploy permalink is generated for each successful deploy of your site. |
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