Pointing Domain Name to Shopify in cPanel: A Quick How-To Guide

A branded domain changes how customers see your store.

yourstore.myshopify.com works. But it doesn’t build trust the way yourstore.com does.

Customers judge a store in seconds. A custom domain signals that you’re a real, established business, not a side project.

The good news? Pointing domain to Shopify is simple.

This works whether you registered your domain with us at Truehost or with another provider. The steps stay almost the same either way.

Here, you’ll use Truehost cPanel’s Zone Editor to connect your domain to Shopify. Your email and other services stay untouched. No downtime. No guesswork.

Pointing a domain to Shopify means updating your domain’s DNS records. Once updated, anyone who types your domain lands on your Shopify store.

You need two records for this:

• An A record for your root domain (like yourstore.com)
• A CNAME record for your www subdomain (like www.yourstore.com)

Here’s the part many store owners miss: your domain stays registered and managed with us at Truehost. Only the storefront moves to Shopify.

You keep local support, DNS control, and email hosting. Shopify handles your storefront, checkout, and payments.

That combination works well for Pakistani businesses. Let’s walk through it step by step.

Step 1: Get the Required DNS Records from Shopify

Start inside Shopify, not cPanel.

1. Log in to your Shopify Admin.
2. Go to Settings → Domains.
3. Click “Connect existing domain.”
4. Enter your full domain name and proceed.

Shopify will now show you two records to add:

• A record: Host @ → 23.227.38.65
• CNAME record: Host www → shops.myshopify.com

Copy these values with care. A typo here is the most common reason a domain fails to connect.

One small note, confirmed in Shopify’s own domain documentation: Shopify sometimes shows a slightly different IP address, depending on your region. This is normal. 23.227.38.65 is the standard value most stores will see, and it’s safe to use.

At this point, your domain will usually show as Pending inside Shopify’s Domains list. That’s expected. It stays pending until the DNS records are live and Shopify can verify them, which happens later, in Step 7.

Don’t try to force verification early; Shopify checks the records automatically once they’re detectable, and repeated early attempts don’t speed anything up.

Once you have both records copied, keep this tab open. You’ll need it in Step 5.

Step 2: Log in to Truehost cPanel and Access DNS Settings

Now switch over to your Truehost account.

1. Log in to your Truehost client area.
2. Open cPanel for the domain you’re connecting.
3. Go to the Domains section.
4. Click Zone Editor (sometimes labeled Advanced Zone Editor).
5. Select your domain and click Manage.

This is where all the DNS editing happens.

Think of the Zone Editor as your domain’s control panel. It tells the internet where to send visitors.

Every record you see listed there, A, CNAME, MX, TXT, plays a different role. For this task, you only need to touch two of them.

If your cPanel layout looks slightly different from what’s described here, don’t worry. Truehost occasionally updates the dashboard design, but the Zone Editor’s core function stays the same.

If this is your first time inside cPanel, take a moment to look around before editing anything.

You’ll see sections for files, email, databases, and security, Zone Editor sits under Domains because DNS is fundamentally about where your domain sends traffic, not how your site is built.

Step 3: Verify the Domain Is Using Truehost Nameservers

Before you touch a single DNS record, check one thing first.

Your domain’s nameservers must point to Truehost. If they don’t, none of your Zone Editor changes will take effect.

Here’s why: nameservers decide where DNS records are read from. If your nameservers point elsewhere, Shopify’s connection will never see the records you add here.

Picture it like a forwarding address for mail, if you update your DNS records but the wrong nameservers are still authoritative, you’re writing changes to a document nobody’s reading.

Where to check this:

Go to your Truehost client area → Domains → Nameservers.

You should see Truehost’s nameservers listed there.

If they’re pointing somewhere else, update them to Truehost’s nameservers first. Then wait a few hours before continuing to Step 4. Skipping this step is the single biggest reason domain connections fail, whether it’s a .com or a .pk or .com.pk domain.

Step 4: Remove Conflicting Records

DNS only works cleanly with one active record type at a time.

Before adding anything new, clean up what’s already there.

Delete the following if you find them:

• Any existing A record for @ pointing elsewhere
• Any existing CNAME record for www
• Parking page records
• Redirect records
• Old hosting records tied to the root domain

Here’s the rule to remember: only one A record for @, and only one CNAME for www.

Extra or conflicting records confuse DNS resolution. Your domain may show errors, or bounce between two different destinations.

This is common if your domain previously ran a WordPress site, a page builder, or even a simple “coming soon” parking page, those setups usually leave behind an A record you no longer need.

Take a screenshot of the old records before deleting them, just in case you need to reference them later. Clear the old ones out completely before moving on.

Step 5: Add the New DNS Records in cPanel

With the old records gone, you’re ready to add the new ones.

Add the A record:

• Type: A
• Name/Host: @
• Points to: 23.227.38.65
• TTL: default

Add the CNAME record:

• Type: CNAME
• Name/Host: www
• Points to: shops.myshopify.com
• TTL: default

TTL stands for “time to live.” It tells other servers how long to remember a record before checking for updates again.

The default value in cPanel (usually 14,400 seconds, or a few hours) works fine for this setup, there’s no need to change it.

One technical detail worth knowing: Shopify’s system expects this value as a fully qualified domain name. Because of that, cPanel may add or require a trailing period after .com.

This comes from how Shopify formats its DNS response; it isn’t a Truehost-specific quirk, so don’t worry if you see it.

Save both records once you’ve entered them.

Need cPanel or DNS support at any point? Our Truehost cPanel hosting team can walk through the Zone Editor with you directly.

Step 6: Wait for DNS Propagation

DNS changes don’t happen instantly.

Typical propagation takes a few minutes to a few hours. In rare cases, it can stretch to 24–48 hours.

During this window, your domain may work for some visitors and not others. That’s normal, whatever registrar manages your domain.

Different networks update their DNS cache at different speeds.

Mobile carriers and some ISPs in Pakistan cache DNS records longer than others, so a visitor on one network might see your new store while a visitor on another still sees the old page for a while.

What to do while you wait:

• Use a tool like whatsmydns.net to check propagation across regions.
• Avoid making repeated changes to the same records.
• Be patient. Editing the records again mid-propagation often resets the clock.

Grab a coffee. This part just takes time. Store owners who check every few minutes tend to get anxious over nothing, the process finishes on its own schedule, and there’s no action you can take to speed it up beyond making sure the records are correct.

Step 7: Verify the Connection in Shopify

Once propagation looks complete, go back to Shopify.

1. Go to Settings → Domains.
2. Click “Verify connection.”
3. Set your domain as the primary domain, if you want it as your main store URL.
4. Test the live domain, ideally in an incognito browser window, so you’re not viewing a cached version.

If verification fails right away, don’t panic. Wait an hour and try again. Most failed first attempts are just propagation still finishing.

Once verified, your domain’s status changes from Pending to Connected inside Shopify’s Domains list. From that point on, visitors typing your domain go straight to your storefront, no myshopify.com in the address bar.

SSL Certificate Section

Once your domain is verified, Shopify automatically issues a free SSL certificate.

You don’t need to buy one separately. You don’t need to install anything.

Within a short time, your store will show the secure padlock in the browser bar (https://). Customers see this as a basic trust signal, and increasingly, they expect it by default.

Browsers actively warn visitors when a site isn’t secure, and that warning alone can push a hesitant shopper straight back to the search results.

SSL also plays a small role in how Google ranks pages, so this one step supports both trust and visibility at the same time.

If you’re moving from a site that previously ran without SSL, or from a page builder with its own certificate, don’t worry about compatibility.

Shopify’s certificate is issued fresh, tied to your domain, and renews automatically in the background. You won’t need to track an expiry date or renew anything manually.

What to Keep in Mind

A few things to remember as you go through this process:

• Patience is important. DNS changes take time. Don’t rush by editing records repeatedly.
• Your email is safe. As long as you don’t touch the MX records from setting up business email in cPanel, email hosted with Truehost keeps working normally.
• The domain moves, not the business. You’re only pointing the domain. Your store, products, and backend all stay on Shopify.
• Local extensions work fine. Pakistani domain extensions like .pk and .com.pk, at their current pricing, connect to Shopify without any special workaround.
• Subdomains are an option too. If you’d rather not use your root domain, you can point a subdomain (like shop.yourdomain.pk) to Shopify instead, using a CNAME record.
• Growth doesn’t mean starting over. If your business grows beyond a single storefront — multiple brands, heavier traffic, or backend automation — Truehost’s VPS and dedicated servers, along with N8n Hosting and AI Workers, can support what you build around your Shopify store without touching the domain setup you’ve already done.

Get Started Now

Pointing your domain to Shopify only takes a few clicks and a short wait for DNS to catch up. Once it’s live, your store looks sharper and more trustworthy from the very first visit.

Manage the technical side with Truehost cPanel hosting, your Zone Editor, email, and domain settings all live in one place, so future changes take minutes, not guesswork.

Ready to connect your domain? Log in to your Truehost cPanel and follow the steps above.

Pointing Domain Name to Shopify in cPanel FAQs