This guide will help you troubleshoot issues like:
- A website isn't publishing to your domain.
- A previously live site has suddenly gone offline.
- Difficulties with a recently purchased Yola domain.
- A domain that was working previously but is now down.
- Incorrect or outdated DNS settings that need adjustments.
Follow the steps outlined below to identify the cause and get your site back online.
A newly purchased Yola domain fails to work
If you're having trouble accessing your website after purchasing a new Yola domain, follow these steps to check whether everything is set up correctly:
- Confirm that you've connected your new Yola domain to the correct website in your Yola account. Take a look at our Connecting your domain to a site tutorial for more information.
- Set the new domain as the primary one if the domain still forwards to a Yola subdomain. You can do this by following the steps in our Assigning domains and creating a primary domain tutorial.
- Wait up to 48 hours for DNS propagation to fully update across the internet.
If you have completed all the steps above and your website is still unreachable, please contact our Customer Support Team for further assistance.
The previously published website is now down
Make sure that your hosting subscription is active
For publishing your website to a custom domain, you need to have an active premium hosting subscription (Yola Bronze, Yola Silver, or Yola Gold). In case your hosting subscription expires, websites that were previously published to custom domains will be taken offline.
To check your hosting subscription status, follow these steps:
- When in the Dashboard, hover over the Account settings link on the Topbar and choose the Subscriptions option from the dropdown menu.
- In the Subscriptions tab, take a look at the Status column next to your hosting subscription.
In case the status is Expired: click the Renew now button and proceed to the checkout to reactivate your subscription for another term. Once your subscription is active again, your website will be back online within a few minutes.
In case your subscription status is Active or your websites are not reinstated after you’ve renewed it, proceed with the troubleshooting instructions below.
Check your domain status and DNS settings
The troubleshooting will vary depending on whether you have published your website to a domain purchased from Yola or a third party. Please review both options below and follow the instructions that apply to your domain.
Yola-purchased domains
If you are using a domain that was bought from Yola, the first thing you need to check is whether your domain subscription is currently active.
To check your domain subscription status:
- Go to My Yola dashboard and click Domains on the Topbar.
- Under Custom domains, find the domain name you used to publish your website.
- Take a look at the Status column:
In case the status is Expired: click the Try to renew button and proceed to the checkout to reactivate your subscription for another term. Once your subscription is renewed, default DNS records will be re-added to your domain and will need to propagate. Please wait up to 48 hours for your website to be back online.
In case the status is Active and your website is still down after you’ve renewed your domain and waited 48 hours, proceed with the troubleshooting instructions below.
Check your domain DNS settings
Your Yola website will appear on your domain only if the right DNS records are added. If you have previously made any changes to your domain DNS, make sure that the default Yola records are still intact or re-add them following the steps below.
- Go to My Yola and click Domains on the Topbar.
- Under Custom domains, find the domain name you used to publish your website and click Advanced settings next to it.
- Scroll down to Change your DNS settings and expand the tab.
- Take a look at your domain’s DNS records:
- If you are faced with the “Name servers for yourdomain.tld are not hosted with Yola. Please manage your DNS settings with your name server host.” warning in red, scroll up and expand the Set up name servers tab.
There, click the Use Yola's name servers button.
Once you see a success message that your name server records are updated back to Yola, refresh the page to verify that other required records have been re-added as well under the Change your DNS settings tab. Here is an example of how these records would look on your domain:
- If you are using Yola name servers, please also make sure that you have two CNAME records on file for your domain. If the above records are missing, please add them manually:
| Type | Name | Value |
| CNAME | yourdomain.tld | premiumhosting.yolasite.net |
| CNAME | www.yourdomain.tld | premiumhosting.yolasite.net |
Note: When adding the reсords, replace yourdomain.tld and www.yourdomain.tld with your actual domain names, for instance, mydomain.com and www.mydomain.com.
Take a look at our article about Other DNS settings for more information.
If you had to change your name server records or re-add the CNAME records, please give them time to propagate and check your website in 48 hours.
In case you are unable to access your DNS records, or they were correct all along, but the website is still down, please contact our Customer Support Team for further assistance.
Pointed Third-Party Domains
Check your domain status: If you are using a domain that you bought from a third party, the first thing you need to check is whether your domain subscription is currently active with your domain provider.
Check your domain DNS: Once you have confirmed that your domain is active, please verify that you are using the correct DNS records to point it to Yola and try to connect the domain to your website once again. To do so, follow the steps from our Publishing to a domain you already own article.
If you have done all of the above, but your website is still down, please contact our Customer Support Team for further assistance.