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I would like to use a naked domain instead of one with a sub domain but am worried about some potential issues down the line.

It is an ecommerce site so if the site grows then a content delivery network (CDN) will most likely be used. I believe you cant use a CNAME on a root domain. Would the best solution be to use a separate external domain e.g. staticexample.com? If we did use an external domain, would that affect images in search results?

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  • You can use a CNAME to alias a domain name to a providers sub-domain. People do this all day every day. No worries. Cheers!!
    – closetnoc
    Commented Feb 28, 2018 at 1:21
  • Using an external domain does not affect your image SERPS and in fact, most companies don't brand their CDNS and just use the ones provided by their CDN provider.
    – Simon Hayter
    Commented Feb 28, 2018 at 1:57
  • Ok thanks. So from what I've researched the only disadvantage of having a "naked" domain would be that cookies get sent to all sub domains, we're not planing on using a sub domain so this isn't an issue. Is there anything else i should be aware of?
    – Techd
    Commented Feb 28, 2018 at 2:47
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    @closetnoc a CNAME can not exist at apex of zone, hence for the "naked" domain. This is per DNS specifications. Various providers offer various workarounds for that.
    – Patrick Mevzek
    Commented Feb 28, 2018 at 15:33
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    @closetnoc and still you can not put a CNAME record at apex of your zone. You can put in it something that will look and work like it, but it is not a CNAME record per the DNS specifications. It may be called like that to pass the idea but it is not the technical definition of a CNAME. Like I said various providers provide various workarounds or look-alike for that, this is nothing new nor magic. And there are a lot of proposals to handle that case. What I am trying to say, sorry for my poor English if not clear, is just a rehash of stackoverflow.com/a/20230670 or numerous others...
    – Patrick Mevzek
    Commented Feb 28, 2018 at 16:12

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You can either use an external domain or subdomain of your main domain with the same results. The only think you have to take into account is that they must be cookieless and fast in order to work propertly as your own CDN.

In the future you will be able to switch easily to a professional CDN in both situations.

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