How to connect DigitalOcean app platform with Cloudflare?

Hey there,

Great to hear you’re getting into the world of hosting! Connecting your domain from Cloudflare to the DigitalOcean App Platform is a great choice for a smooth and scalable hosting experience. I’m here to guide you through the process step by step.

First things first, ensure that your domain is properly set up on Cloudflare. If it’s newly purchased, it might take some time for the DNS settings to propagate fully. Once that’s settled, here’s what you need to do:

1. Configure DigitalOcean App Platform:

   • Go to your DigitalOcean dashboard.
   • Select your app in the App Platform.
   • Navigate to the ‘Settings’ tab.
   • Under the ‘Domains’ section, you’ll have an option to add a domain. Add your Cloudflare domain here.
   • DigitalOcean will provide you with a CNAME record.

2. Update DNS Records on Cloudflare:

   • Log in to your Cloudflare account.
   • Select your domain.
   • Go to the DNS section.
   • You’ll need to add the CNAME record that DigitalOcean provided. This will typically involve entering the name of your app (as a subdomain, like ‘www’ or ‘app’) and the target value provided by DigitalOcean.
   • Make sure the Cloudflare proxy (orange cloud icon) is turned off for this CNAME record, as it needs to be DNS-only (grey cloud icon). This is important for DigitalOcean to validate and manage the domain.

3. Verify and Finalize:

   • Back in the DigitalOcean App Platform, after updating your DNS records in Cloudflare, there might be a verification process.
   • Click ‘Verify’ if prompted. This process can take a little time as DNS changes need to propagate.

Keep in mind that, sometimes DNS changes can take up to 48 hours to fully propagate globally, so don’t worry if it doesn’t work immediately.

For more information, you can check out the docs here:

https://docs.digitalocean.com/products/app-platform/how-to/manage-domains/

Feel free to ask if you have any further questions or run into issues. The community here is always ready to help out. Happy hosting!

Best,

Bobby

Those are great directions - one note - you should keep Cloudflare proxy turned OFF during the connection process. Once the domain is listed as ‘active’, then you can turn on Cloudflare proxy.

However, if you rebuild/redeploy your app after enabling Cloudflare proxy, then DigitalOcean will re-check your CNAME and find that it doesn’t match, and will list the domain as ‘configuring’, and then send you an email 12-24 hours later saying that the domain couldn’t be connected.

Luckily, the domain will remain connected, but you won’t be able to get it to switch back to ‘active’ unless you disable Proxy, rebuild the app, and then re-enable the Cloudflare proxy.