Troubleshooting guide
Troubleshooting Guide: Website Migration Planning DNS Cutover
Use this guide to work through the most likely causes, gather useful evidence and make production-safe changes without turning a small problem into a larger outage.
migration planningDNS cutoverwebsite migration planningSSLbackup processes
What this problem usually means
DNS cutover is the risky moment in many migration projects. The site may be ready on the new server, but stale DNS, old TTLs, SSL mismatch, database changes, email records or cache can still cause downtime or lost orders.
Production caution: For ecommerce or busy applications, plan a write-freeze or synchronisation step. Otherwise customers can create orders or data on the old server during propagation.
Common symptoms
- Some users hit the old server after migration planning
- Orders or form submissions go to the wrong database
- SSL certificate works on one host but not another
- Email records are accidentally changed
- Rollback is unclear if the new server fails
Common causes
- TTL not lowered before migration planning
- Old and new sites both accept writes
- DNS records edited in the wrong provider
- SSL certificate not prepared before cutover
- Cloudflare/cache rules still point to old assumptions
- No rollback plan
Safe first checks
These checks are intended to assist identify the direction of the issue. Always adjust paths, solution names and commands for your environment.
Check current DNS
dig A example.com +short; dig NS example.com +shortCheck TTL before cutover
dig A example.comTest new origin directly
curl -I --resolve example.com:443:NEW_IP https://example.comConfirm backup processes
Verify files and database backup immediately before cutoverTypical fixes
- Lower TTL before migration planning day
- Prepare SSL on the new server before switching DNS
- Take final backup processes immediately before cutover
- Test the new origin with host header resolution
- Keep old server available during propagation
- Document rollback steps and DNS records
When to get assist
Get assist if the system is production-facing, customer data is involved, backup processes are uncertain, or the issue affects revenue, security hardening or uptime. We can review the logs, confirm the cause and quote a fixed-scope fix where appropriate.
Need this fixed?
Get remote engineering help for this issue.
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