Guide On How To Create A Subdomain In cPanel

What Is A SubDomain

Domain name system (DNS) always starts with top-level domains (TLD) such as .com or .org, which is sorted into domains and subdomains.

Subdomains are created when you add a a third-level domain to your existing domain name.

Website owners often use a subdomain or a subdirectory to organize their website content more efficiently.

A typical example is when you have a domain_name.com which is the main domain and create store.domain_name.com or forum.domain_name.com, as subdomains of the main domain.

Or use a subdomain to create a full blown website that is entirely different from your main site.

Or use a subdomain to create a development environment that consists of the testing or staging version of your website.

You can also add additional levels of subdomains: de.store.domain_name.com to further separate your "store" by languages, different target audiences, department, niche, etc.

 

Difference Between Subdomain, SubDirectory and Service Domain

It is important to point out that there are subdomains and then, there are subdirectories.

A subdirectory is when you have the domain_name.com and create a folder called domain_name.com/store.

Subdomains are also different from service subdomains (https://cpanel.domain_name.com instead of https://domain_name.com:2083) that provide configuration information for mail clients, as well as calendar and contacts clients over the standard http and https ports.

When a new cPanel account is created, the system automatically creates service subdomains.

 

When To Use Subdomains OR Subdirectories

Which is better for SEO? Subdomain or Subfolder

There have been a lot of talk out there about the potential negative impact that subdomains can have on SEO performance.

So should you place parts of your site under subdomain.domain_name.com/ or in domain_name.com/subfolder/?

Well, according to most SEO experts (including Neil Patel), most sites should use subdirectories when their website is on one topic.

And when a website is on multiple topics, they should use subdomains.

An example will be when you have a blog about entrepreneurship, then figure out that you want to write about penny stocks and investing.

If you want to write about multiple topics such as these, you may want to consider using a subdomain to create a different brand experience for users.

However, if you have a large website that is popular and high in authority, you can put everything in a subdirectory.

If it is on one topic, it is recommended to use sub directories in order to be seen as an authority.

The reasoning behind this is that Google’s algorithms will recognize the subdomains as sites separate from your main domain, and rank them individually.

This recommendation though must have fallen out of style as Google’s algorithms have become extremely good at crawling both subdomains and subdirectories.

www.imarc.com

Most search engines sees subdomains as separate web addresses from your main domain.

So when artfully used, subdomains can also play a good role in getting traffic to your existing domain.

 

How Many Subdomains Can I Create?

The number of subdomains you can create largely depend on your hosting provider and hosting package.

If you are a Web Hosting Magic customers, we have no limit to the number of subdomains you can create since the only core difference between our hosting packages is just the amount of CPU and RAM that you can have access to.

 

Here be dragons!

Per RFC 1035, each DNS label can contain up to 63 characters, as long as the whole domain name does not exceed a total length of 255 characters, but in practice most domain registries limit at 253 characters.

So when naming your subdomain, you have to ensure that the combination of the subdomain and main domain are within 63 characters.

Another "gotcha" to watch out for is the use of "*" wildcard during subdomain creation.

Due to the order in which Apache processes its configuration file, wildcard subdomains may disrupt the functionality of service subdomains.

It is highly recommended that you use wildcard subdomains only when absolutely necessary, or when you do not need to use service subdomains.

 

How To Create A Subdomain in cPanel

To create a subdomain, you must have an existing domain that you already own.

1. Login to your cPanel control panel.
2. Scroll down to Domains and select Subdomains. This interface allows you to create and manage subdomains for your cPanel account.
3. Enter the desired prefix in the Subdomain text box.
4. Select the desired main domain from the menu.
5. Enter the home directory for the subdomain in the Document Root text box. The Document Root is represented by the house icon.
6. Click Create.

Once you have created the subdomain, our system will attempt to automatically add a request for a Universal SSL certificate to secure the new domain.

To search existing subdomains, perform the following steps:

1. Enter the search criteria in the Search text box.
2. Click Go.

To modify the document root for a subdomain, perform the following steps:

1. Click the notepad icon that corresponds to the subdomain that you want to manage.
2. Enter the new file path that you want to use as the document root in the available text box.
3. Click Change.

To enable or disable redirection of a subdomain, perform the following steps:

1. Click the Manage Redirection link that corresponds to the subdomain that you wish to manage.
2. If you wish to redirect the subdomain, enter the link to which you want to redirect the subdomain in the available text box.
3. Click Save.

To disable the redirect, click Disable Redirection.

To remove an existing subdomain, perform the following steps:

 

1. Click the Remove link that corresponds to the subdomain that you want to remove.
2. Click Yes to confirm that you want to remove the subdomain.
3. To keep the subdomain, click No.

That is how to create a subdomain in cPanel, folks!.