How to connect your Squarespace domain to your Service Bay Digital website

Your domain is registered at Squarespace (this includes domains that moved over from Google Domains). To make it show the website we built you, you change two records in your own Squarespace account: the www address, and the plain address without the www. It takes about five minutes and you keep the domain.

Read this part first. Your email is not involved and does not change. You change two records: the www address, and the plain address without the www. You will not touch your nameservers, your email (MX) records, your TXT records or DNSSEC. If any screen asks you to change nameservers, stop and tell us. You never need to for this.

Squarespace won’t let you edit DNS records while forwarding is on, so if your domain has a forwarding rule, it comes off first (step 4).

Before you change anything, write down what’s there. Take a photo or screenshot of your records screen before you edit it. If you ever want to go back, that picture is all you need.

The steps

Tell us before you touch anything

Reply to our email and say go. We switch both addresses on at our end first, and we check from the outside that your email does not depend on the plain address (for nearly every shop it doesn’t) and that nothing on your domain would block its security certificate. If the records go in before we’ve done that, your address shows an error page instead of your site. Told first, the whole thing is uneventful.

Open your domain

Sign in at squarespace.com and open your domains dashboard, then click your domain name. (If your domain came from Google Domains and you’ve never signed in to Squarespace, choose Continue with Google.) We never ask for your Squarespace password, and no honest company would.

Check your nameservers, don’t change them

Click DNS, then Domain Nameservers. If it says Use Squarespace nameservers, carry on. Names ending in googledomains.com count as Squarespace’s own. If it says Use Custom Nameservers, stop and tell us: your records live somewhere else, and we’ll send the steps for that place. If any screen asks you to change nameservers, stop and tell us.

Remove any forwarding

Click Website and look under Domain Forwarding Rules. If there’s a rule, delete it. (Rules that came over from Google Domains are listed here too.)

Open DNS settings

Click DNS, then DNS Settings.

Remove the Squarespace Defaults, if they’re there

If you see a group called Squarespace Defaults, click the red trash can next to it, then Delete. Squarespace may ask for your password or your two-factor code. These defaults point your domain at a Squarespace website, and your domain can’t point at your new site while they’re in place. Your email records are in their own group (for example Google Workspace or Google records). Leave those exactly as they are.

Add the www record

Scroll down to Custom Records and click Add record. In Type, choose CNAME. In Name, enter www. In Data, enter the www value in our email to you, with no https://, no slash and no dot at the end. Click Save. If Squarespace says a www record already exists, click Replace record.

Add the plain-address record

In Custom Records, click Add record again. In Type, choose A. In Name, enter @. In IP Address, enter the plain-address value in our email to you. Click Save.

Remove anything else on the plain address

In Custom Records, if there’s another A, AAAA or ALIAS record named @ (left by a previous host), click the red trash can beside it, then Confirm. Never remove MX or TXT records.

Expect a few odd minutes

For a short while, your address may refuse to load. You won’t get a warning you can click past, just a browser saying it can’t make a secure connection. That’s our end issuing the security certificates for your two addresses. It’s normal and it clears itself. A phone on mobile data may see your old site a little longer than your laptop does. Squarespace says DNS changes can take 24 to 48 hours to work everywhere; most of the time it’s much sooner.

Tell us it is done

Reply to our email. We check that both addresses reach your new site over a proper secure connection, with or without the www and with or without https://, and that your mail records are exactly where they were.

Questions people actually ask

Will this break my email?

No. Email runs on its own records, and you don’t touch them. The www address and the plain address are web addresses only, and we check before you start that your mail doesn’t lean on either.

Do I lose my domain?

No. It stays registered to you at Squarespace, you keep paying Squarespace for it, and it stays yours.

Can I change it back?

Yes. Put both records back to the values in your before-photo. Nothing here is one-way.

Why does the plain address point at a different value from www?

The www record sends visitors to your new site. The plain-address record sends anyone who leaves the www off to the same place, keeping the page they asked for, over a secure connection.

My records aren’t at Squarespace, they’re somewhere else.

That happens: a domain bought in one place can have its records kept in another. Make the same two changes wherever your records live, or tell us where that is and we’ll send the steps for that company. Don’t move your nameservers to make Squarespace’s screens work.

My shop email is Google Workspace. Is it safe?

Yes. Your Workspace records sit in their own group on the DNS screen, and nothing on this page touches them. You don’t change nameservers, so nothing disconnects.

Does this cancel my Squarespace website?

It stops your domain showing it. If you still pay Squarespace for a website plan, that’s a separate subscription; cancel it yourself once you’re happy with the new site.

I use PayPal Payment Links through Squarespace.

Squarespace says those stop working when the Squarespace Defaults are removed. Tell us before step 6 and we’ll sort it out with you first.

Squarespace won’t save the A record.

Another record on @ is in the way: an A, AAAA or ALIAS left by a previous host (step 9), or a forwarding rule (step 4). Tell us what the message says if you can’t find it.

Registered somewhere else?

Plenty of owners find their domain is not where they thought it was. If it is not at Squarespace, open the page for the company it is at — the screens and the wording are different at every one.

Not sure which of these you are with? Start here and we will work it out with you.

Steps checked against Squarespace’s own help pages, “Edit your domain’s DNS records”, “Pointing a Squarespace domain”, “DNS records for web hosting”, “Forwarding a domain”, “Troubleshooting issues with DNS records”, “Review, change, or reset your domain’s nameservers”, on 2026-10-08. Squarespace can change its screens without telling anyone; if what you see doesn’t match this page, tell us and we’ll fix the page.