Top 6 Best DNS Hosting Providers of 2023

Domain Name System (DNS) is a modern network architecture that maps domain names to IP addresses.

A DNS lookup is initiated whenever a visitor enters a domain name into the browser. The DNS resolver then tries to connect with the root server, TLD servers, and, finally, authoritative servers to find the IP address associated with that domain name. The browser uses this IP address to connect with the corresponding server and retrieve the web page.

DNS hosting provider allows users to manage Domain Name System Records stored across multiple servers efficiently. DNS records are crucial in resolving domain names to their corresponding IP addresses and include A, AAAA, CNAME, MX, TXT, and several other record types.

Opting for the best DNS host is recommended to ensure enhanced uptime, speed, and security of your website.

How to Choose the Best DNS Hosting Provider?

When choosing the best DNS provider, plenty of free and paid options are available. All of them offer a unique balance of features and performance.

However, the key to success lies in considering your business needs and making wise choices based on the following factors.

1. Speed

For a positive user experience and faster webpage loading time, a DNS server must respond to queries quickly.

DNS providers use a geographically distributed network of DNS servers to achieve better speed and performance. It's worth noting that the more DNS servers a provider has, the better the speed.

2. Security

The best DNS host should offer complete protection against cyber threats. You may never wish to face loss of sensitive information and financial losses due to DDoS attacks and Hijacking.

Ensure your DNS host uses DNSSEC security protocol, advanced network filtering, strong encryption, and more to keep your website safe.

3. 100% Uptime

Research has demonstrated that even several minutes of website downtime can result in substantial business losses for e-commerce websites. Simply put, any downtime for an online business means financial and reputation losses.

Therefore, DNS hosts must offer 100% uptime. Note that multiple DNS providers claim to provide 100% website uptime, but in reality, only a handful of them actually deliver on this promise.

4. Redundancy

Users certainly do not want their websites to go offline due to hardware failure or network outage issues on their DNS hosting provider's end. 

A single dedicated DNS server is not enough. Instead, using a secondary DNS server is crucial for achieving success in DNS management, as it serves as a reliable backup server. The primary objective of a secondary DNS server is to replicate and synchronize the DNS records from the primary domain name server.

Therefore, selecting a DNS hosting provider that employs multiple servers, network paths, and load balancing is crucial to ensure reliability in the event of disruptions. It must allow users to configure secondary nameservers.

Overview of the Best DNS Hosting Providers in 2023

1. Cloudflare

Best 100% Uptime SLA

Cloudflare is a well-known DNS hosting provider that is recognized for its advanced security features, including built-in DDoS mitigation and DNSSEC.

It is one of the largest DNS services that is used by more than 38% of managed domains on the web. Many huge businesses, such as IBM, Garmin, JCB, Zendesk, and Shopify, use Cloudflare to protect themselves from cyber threats.

Key Features

• Flexible and Quick Setup – By using Cloudflare DNS, you can keep your existing hosting provider and domain registrar while still being able to benefit from their advanced DNS features. You're good to go by just reconfiguring your current registrar's nameservers to point to Cloudflare's nameservers.
• 100% SLA-backed Uptime – Cloudflare offers a 100% uptime guarantee so that your website always stays available without downtime. Thanks to the data centers in 285 cities and 100 countries. These DNS servers are empowered by the state of the art failover protection and much more to offer 100% website uptime.
• DDoS Protection – DDoS attacks seriously threaten growing and large-scale businesses. Fortunately, Cloudflare is a top-tier DNS hosting provider that offers robust security measures to combat these attacks. These measures include rate limiting, an IP reputation database, CAPTCHA, and other advanced features designed to prevent malicious traffic and ensure legitimate users can access the website without any issues.
• Speed and Reduced Latency – Cloudflare's speed is well-appreciated by the users. It uses a global Anycast network, CDN, DNS caching, and more to offer excellent speed and performance. IP Anycast routing ensures that the users will be routed to the nearest data center for improved response time.
• Security – It supports DNSSEC (Domain Name System Security) protocol and features strong encryption to protect users from online threats. Using WAF (web application firewall) and SSL/TLS encryption, Cloudflare effectively prevents vulnerabilities like SQL injection and zero-day attacks, ensuring secure communication between users and websites.
• Data Privacy – Cloudflare keeps visitors' sensitive information safe using a proprietary 1.1.1.1 DNS resolver that prevents data mining. Additionally, in contrast to competitors, it promises that it won't use data for marketing purposes.
• Load Balancing – It is an essential feature for a redundant DNS strategy that ensures uninterrupted website access for users. Load balancing provides a reliable DNS hosting service by distributing traffic across multiple Cloudflare servers.
• Free plan with premium features – Cloudflare is a reputed DNS host that offers an impressive array of premium features through its free program, including global CDN, unmetered DDoS protection, SSL certificate, static content caching, WebSockets, reputation-based threat protection, and many more.

Pros

• 24/7 customer support
• Easy-to-use interface
• Customizable DNS records
• State-of-the-art DDoS-protected servers
• Lightning-fast page load time
• Dynamic DNS support
• Supports DNS64 to generate an IPv6 address for networks that primarily use IPv4
• Range of add-on services, including Argo Smart Routing
• Robust security features
• Average DNS global lookup speed of 11ms
• Supports TOR clients to allow anonymous browsing
• Impressive reporting capabilities

Cons

• 100% SLA-backed uptime is limited to a few premium plans
• Paid plans are pretty expensive

Pricing

Cloudflare includes free and paid pricing plans. The free plan boasts a range of premium features, including global CDN and unmetered DDoS protection. The free program is best suited for personal and small business websites.

However, you must opt for paid plans to leverage priority customer support, advanced analytics, CAPTCHA, additional WAF rules, and more.

There are three paid plans:

• Pro
• Business
• Enterprise

Each plan offers a flat 20% discount for an annual commitment.

Also, users need to pay additionally for add-on services such as Rate Limiting, Argo Smart Routing, Load Balancing, and Static IPs.

2. DNS Made Easy

Best Managed DNS Hosting

DNS Made Easy is a fully managed DNS host offering businesses powerful and flexible DNS solutions. The company has been serving millions of domains for the past 20 years. It handles 180+ billion queries per day.

You will be surprised by the website uptime and performance offered by their reliable and scalable DNS infrastructure.

Key Features

• 100% SLA-backed uptime – DNS Made Easy provides 100% SLA-backed uptime across all their pricing plans, ensuring businesses have peace of mind knowing that their website will always be available and operational.
• Security – DNS Made Easy implements multiple security measures to ensure a secure DNS infrastructure. Firewalls are placed on PoPs to prevent unauthorized access and DNS spoofing. Additionally, there is support for DNSSEC protocol and two-factor authentication to enhance security.
• Geo load balancing – For low latency and improved user experience, the DNS Made Easy identifies the end user's location using their IP address and routes them to the nearest server. Geo Load Balancing helps DNS Made Easy offer a reliable and high-performing DNS service.
• Real-time analytics – DNS Made Easy includes robust reporting, and users will have access to real-time DNS analytics for quicker response to issues and cyber attacks. It also provides alerts in case of any suspicious or malicious activity.
• Rest API access – The DNS hosting provider allows users to create, update, and delete DNS records programmatically. Users can manage TL values and use services like Global Traffic Director, HTTP Redirection, Failover, and more besides these basic tasks.
• Flexible pricing plans – DNS Made Easy offers flexible pricing plans that cater to any organization's needs. Additionally, all pricing plans allow users to add more domains, queries, additional users, and other features as per their requirements.

Pros

• Easy-to-use interface
• Anycast DNS network
• Programmatic management using Rest API
• State-of-the-art managed DNS service
• DDoS protection
• Two-factor and three-factor authentication
• IP restricting
• Advanced analytics
• Excellent traffic management using multiple PoS and Geo Load Balancing
• Robust security features
• Dynamic DNS service
• Low DNS lookup time
• Redundant infrastructure

Cons

• Expensive pricing plans
• 24/7 customer support is limited to the Enterprise plan
• Phone and live chat support is not available for DNS-5 and DNS-25 plan users
• The CPanel plugin is a bit tricky to setup

Pricing

DNS Made Easy offers flexible pricing plans to accommodate the needs of businesses of all sizes. Their four plans vary based on the number of domains, users, queries, and other similar features.

Here are DNS Made Easy pricing plans:

DNS-5 Plan – 14.50 per month includes five domains, 1500 records, and 5 million queries
DNS-25 Plan – $45 per month includes 25 domains, 7500 records, and 25 million queries
DNS-50 Plan – $145 per month includes 50 domains, 15000 records, and 50 million queries
Enterprise Plan – Starting at $2000 per month

Note that DNS Made Easy doesn't provide a free plan. However, you can evaluate their service by accessing a 30-day free trial.

3. Amazon Route 53

Best Cost-effective DNS Hosting

Amazon Route 53 aims to secure communication between end users and websites with the network of DNS servers located strategically across the globe. Route 53 is an authoritative DNS system that answers DNS queries and translates domain names into IP addresses.

The state-of-the-art DNS routing capabilities of Route 53 help businesses minimize latency and ensure high website uptime, resulting in a positive customer experience.

Famous brands like McDonald's, Netflix, and Slack use Amazon's DNS services.

Key Features

• 99.99% SLA-backed uptime – Amazon Route 53 DNS hosting provider guarantees an uptime or DNS availability of 99.99% throughout the year, ensuring your website is almost always available to users. It is made possible by its excellent DNS infrastructure, which is supported by a global network of servers.
• Transparent pricing – Route 53 uses a unique pricing scheme where you only pay for the resources you use instead of subscriptions. The charges are based on the number of hosted zones and the queries processed per month, providing a flexible and cost-effective solution for businesses.
• Scalability – Amazon Route 53 is a DNS hosting provider equipped to handle large-scale DNS queries. It is designed to manage increasing website traffic efficiently, ensuring your website stays up and running smoothly. 
• Security – The hosting provider includes two primary security features: DNSSEC signing and DNS Firewall. DNSSEC signing ensures that DNS responses have not been tampered with, while DNS Firewall allows users to filter unwanted traffic. With DNS Firewall, users can create domain lists and define rules to block or allow traffic based on a domain name, IP address, and other attributes. 
• Speed – The extensive network of servers, low latency, IP-based routing, and DNS failover guarantee high-speed performance and reliability. The provider efficiently routes traffic to the nearest DNS server and balances traffic loads by identifying the user's location and IP address.
• Geo load balancing – This feature is designed to direct traffic based on the end user's geographic location, ensuring that users are connected to the closest available endpoint to minimize latency and improve overall performance. Route 53's geo load balancing provides low latency, redundancy, and enhanced security.
• Health checks – Amazon Route 53 continually monitors the performance and health of your web servers and other resources to ensure the availability of your site. This proactive approach to monitoring also enables the hosting provider to handle DNS failover situations effectively.
• Integration with AWS services – One of the key selling points of this solid DNS provider is its seamless integration with AWS services like Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2), Amazon CloudFront, Amazon S3, AWS Elastic Load Balancer (ELB), and more.

Pros

• Affordable and scalable pricing plans
• Low latency
• Latency and IP-based routing
• Multi-CDN routing
• API support for automated DNS management
• Large API library
• A huge DNS server network
• Redundant infrastructure
• Low DNS lookup time
• Seamless integration with AWS services
• Built-in load-balancing capabilities
• 24/7 customer support

Cons

• Route 53's user interface is not beginner-friendly
• Amazon uses data for monetization, which raises concerns about data privacy

Pricing

Amazon Route 53 comes with a transparent and predictable pricing model. Simply put, you pay as you go. The hosting provider doesn't ask for upfront payments. 

The charges depend upon the number of hosted zones and queries per month. Please click here to check the Amazon AWS pricing page for detailed information.

Hosted Zones and Records

• For the first 25 hosted zones – $0.50/month for each hosted zone
• Additional hosted zones – $0.10/month for each hosted zone

Queries

• Standard Queries (per 1 million queries) – $0.40/month for the first 1 Billion queries and after that, $0.20/month
• Latency-Based Routing Queries (per 1 million queries) – $0.60/month for the first 1 Billion queries and after that, $0.30/month
• Geo DNS and Geoproximity Queries (per 1 million queries) – $0.70/month for the first 1 Billion queries and after that, $0.35/month
• IP-Based Routing Queries (per 1 million queries) – $0.80/month for the first 1 Billion queries and after that, $0.40/month

Note that no free plan or trial version is available to evaluate the AWS Route 53 DNS services. 

4. Comodo

Best Secure DNS Hosting

Their Secure Internet Gateway (SIG) is perfect for those seeking advanced web-based threat protection against malware, ransomware, phishing, and more.

In addition to SIG, there are several other security solutions available that offer further protection.

Key Features

• Security – Comodo Secure DNS prioritizes safety and claims to provide advanced protection from various online threats. They include phishing attacks, malware, botnets, C&C callbacks, spyware, drive-by downloads, XSS scripting, cookie stealing, anonymizers, and encrypted files, using its Valkyrie threat analysis engine. Users can create custom blacklists and whitelists with URL and content filtering and enable country-based blocking.
• Advanced real-time reporting – Users can monitor malicious online activities by visitors, groups, devices, and locations. With custom report-building features, users can conduct enhanced analysis and stay vigilant against potential internet threats, taking action before they cause any business losses.
• Firewall – Comodo's security solution includes static and behavioral malware analysis at the gateways and signature-based antimalware protection. It also offers unified threat management through features like content filtering and HTTPS interception within the Firewall.
• Load balancing – Comodo provides WAN load balancing and failover protection for improved reliability and redundancy. This service routes traffic to the nearest server, which ensures faster speeds.

Pros

• Comprehensive cyber security solutions
• Anycast DNS infrastructure hosted in 25+ countries
• Flexible pricing 
• Easy-to-use user interface
• Protection from parked domains that redirect users to malicious websites
• SSL decryption and inspection
• Includes CDN
• Behavioral analysis and detection
• Intelligent content and URL filtering
• 24/7 email support
• Bandwidth management
• Threat Intelligence of Comodo with real-time security updates 
• Protection of data in motion, use, and rest

Cons

• It is not as fast as Cloudflare and DNS Made Easy
• It doesn't guarantee 100% website uptime
• Fewer DNS servers across the globe

Pricing

Comodo is a free DNS service that offers all its features and benefits at no cost.

5. Quad9

Best Free DNS Hosting

Quad9 is one of the most reliable and secure DNS providers of 2023. It is based in Switzerland, a country with strict data privacy laws and regulations.

The company is dedicated to enhancing internet security and providing excellent privacy protection to users.

Despite being a free service, Quad9 offers decent features typically found in premium DNS service providers.

Key Features

• Data privacy – Quad9 utilizes advanced data privacy protection mechanisms and is regulated by Swiss data privacy protection laws to ensure the highest level of data privacy. The company does not collect or retain sensitive information from users and also aids businesses in complying with GDPR.
• Free to use – A non-profit organization operates the DNS service to provide a safer and more reliable internet for all users.
• Speed – Quad9 boasts a vast network of 183 strategically located DNS resolvers across 90 countries, enabling them to provide exceptional speed and performance for their users.
• Security – The company claims to use threat intelligence from a database of more than 20 leading cybersecurity companies to block a wide range of threats, including malware, phishing, spyware, and botnets. The company maintains precise and up-to-date information about safe and dangerous websites, helping to ensure that users are protected from online threats.

Pros

• Top-notch data privacy protection
• Excellent speed
• Advanced and premium security features
• Easy to configure
• Extensive knowledge base, FAQ section, and support from the community
• A huge DNS server network
• Low latency
• Redundant infrastructure
• Offers minimum latency in North America and Europe

Cons

• Lacks dedicated customer support
• It doesn't guarantee 100% uptime
• Lacks DNS filtering
• Email forwarding is not possible
• Basic analytics and reporting
• Not suitable for enterprise use

Pricing

Quad9 is a free DNS service that offers all its features and benefits at no cost.

6. AdGuard DNS

Best for Precise Blocking & Filtering

AdGuard DNS offers comprehensive protection against hackers and other online threats by safeguarding all DNS requests. It's a free DNS service that's particularly well-suited for personal and small business websites.

A variety of customizable filtering options and exceptional privacy protection by AdGuard DNS ensure secure and safe communication between users and websites.

Key Features

• Advanced filtering – By default, the service blocks all ads, trackers, and phishing websites at the DNS level, preventing these threats from ever reaching the user's device. It allows you to create custom filters to meet your specific needs. AdGuard DNS's filters offer protection against online threats such as malware, ransomware, and phishing, ensuring a safe browsing experience.
• Data privacy – To safeguard user privacy and prevent data mining, AdGuard DNS does not store any user browsing data. In addition, the DNS hosting provider employs robust encryption at the DNS level, further enhancing the security of users' online activities.
• Speed – AdGuard DNS is supported by over 50 servers across 15+ locations. These servers ensure secure and reliable DNS hosting by providing traffic routing and redundancy capabilities.
• Security – Besides its advanced DNS filtering capabilities, AdGuard DNS offers various security features, such as support for the DNSSEC protocol, robust encryption using DoQ, and more. These features ensure that DNS hosted on AdGuard DNS is well-protected against hackers and other online threats.
• Detailed reporting – It allows users to view all DNS requests and provides detailed information such as location and server data. Additionally, the service offers real-time statistics on DNS requests for all devices, which can be filtered by date, country, and device, to provide a more customized data view.
• Affordable pricing plans – AdGuard offers a free plan that includes two servers and can handle up to 300,000 queries per month. The cheapest plan is priced at just $2.49 per month and provides five servers and 10 million queries. In my view, both of these plans are well-suited for personal and small business websites, providing ample resources to support their DNS needs.

Pros

• Granular-level domain blocking and filtering options
• Easy-to-use user interface
• Forever free plan for small websites with limited traffic
• Excellent data privacy protection
• Customer support via email and chat
• Strong encryption using DoH and DoT protocols
• Low latency
• Supports DNSSEC protocol
• Ensures high speed and reliable browsing experience
• Compatible with VPNs

Cons

• It is not as fast as Cloudflare and DNS Made Easy
• It doesn't guarantee 100% website uptime
• A smaller DNS server network
• The free plan doesn't include customer support

Pricing

AdGuard offers one free and three paid pricing plans. The plans vary based on the number of servers, devices, customer support, and queries that need to be handled monthly.

The free plan can handle 300,000 queries per month. It is more than sufficient for a small website with limited traffic.

Here are AdGuard DNS's pricing plans:

Personal Plan – $2.49 per month includes five servers and 10 million queries
Team Plan – $14.99 per month includes 50 servers and 100 million queries
Enterprise Plan – Custom pricing, includes unlimited servers and queries

If you are unsatisfied with AdGuard DNS after purchasing, the company offers a 30-day money-back guarantee.

FAQs about Best DNS Hosting Providers in 2023

Recap: The Best 5 DNS Hosting Providers in 2023

Opting for the right DNS hosting provider will safeguard you from losing traffic and promote long-term business growth.

Making a decision based on factors such as uptime, performance, security, redundancy, and data privacy is of utmost importance.

Here are our top recommendations for the six best DNS hosting providers in 2023.

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