Knowledge Base

Adding Domain Aliases

Watch the video tutorial

Domain aliases allow you to point several domain names to the same
website. This can be useful, for example, for branding purposes.

To set up a domain alias in Plesk:

Go to Websites & Domains and run the Add Domain Alias wizard.
Specify the domain for which you are creating an alias (the primary
domain) and the alias’s domain name, for example alias.tld, and
set up the following:

Synchronization of DNS zone with the primary domain

If this option is enabled, the DNS zone of the domain alias will be
in sync with the zone of the primary domain. Any changes made in the
DNS zone of the primary domain will be automatically applied to the
DNS zone of the alias. For example, if you create the CNAME record
like blog.primary_domain.tld, the corresponding
blog.alias.tld record will be added to the zone of the alias.

Note: If a domain alias’s DNS zone is synced with the primary domain,
you cannot modify resource records in the alias’s DNS zone.
Mail service

Plesk does not allow creating mailboxes under domain aliases.
Instead, the mailboxes of the primary domain are used. If you select
the Mail service option, the mailboxes created under the primary
domain will also be available under the alias. To enable users to
read mail sent to mailboxes under the alias, Plesk redirects it to
the corresponding mailboxes under the primary domain.

For example:

You have an email address [email protected]. Then you set up an
alias for domain.tld, for example, alias.tld. If you select
the Mail service option, all mail sent to [email protected] will
be available at [email protected]. Otherwise, the mailbox
[email protected] will not receive mail sent to [email protected].
Web service

If this option is turned on, the website will open in the browser at
the alias’s URL. If you clear the Web service check box, the
alias will be used for mail only provided that Mail service is
selected.
Redirect with the HTTP 301 code

By default, Plesk uses web server external redirection for aliases.
In this case, the alias appears to be a separate website for visitors
and for web search engines. This causes a problem because search
engines index the content of the alias separately, so your primary
domain loses search engine rankings.

To avoid this, you can use redirection with the HTTP 301 code (Moved
permanently) by selecting Redirect with the HTTP 301 code. In
this case, only the primary domain will rank in search engines. Learn
more at
http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=93633
Java web applications

If you use hosting services based on a Linux platform, and you have
Java applications installed on your site that you want to make
accessible through the domain alias, select the Java web
applications option.