How to Use Domain Forwarding in cPanel in Pakistan

Domain forwarding lets you automatically send visitors from one domain or URL to another. Instead of visitors hitting a dead page or a domain you no longer use actively, they land exactly where you want them, without you touching a single line of code.

For Pakistani businesses, this comes up more often than people expect. A few common scenarios:

• Rebranding: you’ve changed your business name and registered a new domain, but people still type the old one from memory or old ads.
• Bringing .pk, .com.pk, and .com domains under one main website: many Pakistani businesses register several extensions of the same name defensively, then want all of them pointing to a single, primary site.
• Fixing www/non-www versions: making sure www.yoursite.com and yoursite.com don’t behave as two separate sites, which can confuse visitors and split your SEO signals.
• Moving away from an old domain after changing hosting providers: especially useful during a transition period, so old links and bookmarks don’t break.

Before setting anything up, it helps to know the four building blocks of domain forwarding:

• 301 redirect (permanent): Use this when the old domain or URL has permanently moved to a new one. It also helps search engines transfer SEO signals to the new URL.
• 302 redirect (temporary): Use this when the change is only temporary, such as during maintenance.
• Standard forwarding: Sends visitors to the new URL, which appears in their browser. This is the recommended option for most businesses.
• Masked forwarding: Sends visitors to the new website while keeping the old URL in the browser. It can confuse visitors and search engines, so it is generally not recommended for long-term use.

This guide walks through what you need before you start, exactly how to set up forwarding in cPanel, when it makes sense to use it, and how to fix the problems that come up most often.

What You Need Before Setting Up Domain Forwarding

a) An active domain

Your domain must be registered and currently active; an expired or suspended domain won’t forward correctly regardless of what you configure in cPanel.

If you’re working with a .pk domain (including .com.pk, .org.pk, .net.pk, and similar), it’s worth understanding how the registration side works locally. PKNIC (Pakistan Network Information Centre) is the organization responsible for administering the .PK namespace; it runs the registry, maintains the root DNS for .pk domains, and handles the registration records themselves. However, PKNIC generally doesn’t sell hosting or manage your website’s DNS day-to-day; that part is usually handled separately by a hosting provider or a PKNIC reseller. 

In practice, this means your domain’s registration and your domain’s hosting/DNS can sit with two different companies, and both need to be in order before forwarding will work.

b) cPanel hosting

You need access to the cPanel account that controls the domain; not just any hosting account, but specifically the one where the domain (or the destination it’s pointing to) actually resolves. 

You’ll also need the hosting provider to have the Redirects feature enabled on your account. Most shared and reseller hosting plans in Pakistan include this by default, but it’s worth checking with your host if the feature doesn’t appear in your cPanel dashboard.

c) Access to your domain/DNS settings

If the domain doesn’t already point to the hosting account where you’ll be creating the redirect, you’ll need access to your domain registrar or DNS manager as well. It helps to keep the roles straight:

• Domain registrar: the company where the domain is registered (for example, PKNIC or a PKNIC reseller for .pk domains, or an international registrar for .com domains).
• DNS: the system that directs the domain to a specific server, usually configured through nameservers or A/CNAME records.
• cPanel: where the actual redirect rule is created, once the domain is already pointing to the correct server.

In short: the domain has to reach the hosting server first (via DNS) before cPanel can do anything with it.

d) Destination URL

Decide exactly where visitors should land; not just the domain, but the specific page if that’s relevant. Always use the complete URL, including https://. cPanel requires a protocol (http:// or https://) in the destination field, and leaving it out is one of the most common reasons a redirect fails to save or behaves unexpectedly.

Step-by-Step: Setting Up Domain/URL Forwarding in cPanel

i) Log in to cPanel.

ii) Go to Domains → Redirects. Depending on your hosting provider’s cPanel theme, “Redirects” may be listed directly under the “Domains” section, or you can simply type “Redirects” into the cPanel search bar to jump straight to it.

iii) Choose the redirect type: Permanent (301) if the move is final, or Temporary (302) if you expect to reverse it or reuse the original URL later.

iv) Select the domain to redirect from the dropdown. Every domain and subdomain associated with the cPanel account will appear here, including an option to select all public domains if you want the same rule applied broadly.

v) Enter the destination URL, making sure it includes http:// or https://.

vi) Set the www handling option. You’ll typically see three choices:

• Only redirect with www: only visitors who type the www version get redirected.
• Redirect with or without www: all visitors are redirected regardless of whether they include www.
• Do not redirect www: visitors using the www version are left alone. For most businesses consolidating domains, “Redirect with or without www” is the safest default, since it catches all variations of how someone might type your address.

vii) (Optional) Enable Wildcard Redirect if you also want all subdirectories and subdomains of the old domain to redirect to the corresponding path on the new one, rather than just the homepage.

viii) Click Add and confirm the success message. The new rule should now appear in the “Current Redirects” list at the bottom of the page.

After setup, it’s worth testing the redirect in a private/incognito browser window, since your regular browser may cache the old page and make it look like nothing changed.

When Should You Use Domain Forwarding?

Domain forwarding is useful any time you want visitors to land on the right website or page automatically, rather than hitting an old or inactive one. Common situations include:

• Moving from an old domain to a new one after a rebrand or business change.
• Redirecting a .pk domain to a .com domain (or vice versa), so you’re not maintaining two separate live sites.
• Redirecting a .com.pk domain to your main website, common when a business registers the local extension mainly to protect its name.
• Sending visitors from an old page to a new page after restructuring your site.
• Redirecting an alternative or shorter domain, such as a marketing-friendly nickname, to your primary site.
• Redirecting an old domain after rebranding, so existing customers, bookmarks, and backlinks aren’t lost.

Common Domain Forwarding Problems

Even a correctly configured redirect can seem “broken” at first. Here are the issues that come up most often, and how to fix them.

Problem	Likely Cause	Fix
Redirect not working or keeps looping	Conflicting redirect or www settings	Check the www option, disable Wildcard if unnecessary, and make sure the destination doesn’t redirect back to the original domain.
Domain can’t be redirected	The domain isn’t added to cPanel or DNS hasn’t updated yet	Add the domain to cPanel and wait for DNS changes to take effect.
.htaccess conflict	Existing redirect or rewrite rules are conflicting	Check .htaccess for conflicting rules. Back up the file before making changes.
SSL/HTTPS error	The destination doesn’t have a valid SSL certificate	Install an SSL certificate on the destination domain and make sure HTTPS is working.
Website and email forwarding are confused	Website redirects and email forwarding are separate features	Use Domains → Redirects for website visitors and Email → Forwarders for email.

If a redirect still isn’t working after checking all of the above, the next step is usually to verify with your hosting provider that the domain is correctly pointed to the account and that the Redirects feature is active; particularly important in Pakistan, where the domain registrar (such as PKNIC or a reseller) and the hosting provider are frequently two separate companies, and a gap between the two is the most frequent root cause of forwarding issues.

Send Your Domain Visitors to the Right Place

Domain forwarding is a small setup step that solves a lot of real problems, consolidating .pk, .com.pk, and .com domains under one brand, fixing a www mismatch, or making sure no one lands on a dead page after you’ve switched hosts. Once your domain and DNS are pointed correctly, the redirect itself takes just a few minutes to configure in cPanel.

The part that actually needs to be right is the foundation underneath it: hosting that gives you full, unrestricted access to the Redirects tool, without waiting on a support ticket to enable it. That’s exactly what you get with Truehost’s cPanel hosting; every plan comes with cPanel access, so you can set up redirects, manage DNS, and bring all your domains under one site whenever you need to, without extra approvals or add-on fees.

How to Use Domain Forwarding in cPanel in Pakistan: FAQs