Route 53 is the GPS for the internet. Amazon Route 53 manages the DNS records for your domain, allowing you to associate domain names with resources such as EC2 instances, S3 buckets, and load balancers. When you type a website address into your browser, like example.com, Route 53 is the system that figures out where that website is located and directs your request to the right place.
It is a highly available and scalable Domain Name System (DNS) web service. You can use Route 53 for Domain Registration, DNS Routing, and health checking.
The Only AWS Service which provides 100% Availability SLA
• Domain Name System (DNS): Just like how you remember your friend's name instead of their phone number. It translates the human-friendly hostnames into the machine IP addresses.
• www.google.com => 172.217.18.36
• DNS is the backbone of the Internet
• DNS uses hierarchical naming structure
Route 53 hosted zone is a collection of records for a specified domain that can be managed together. There are two types of zones:
● Public host zone – Everyone can publicly access ex: Youtube, Google
● Private hosted zone – It determines how traffic is routed within VPC.
For private hosted zones, the following VPC settings must be ‘true’:
1.enableDnsHostname.
2.enableDnsSupport.
Health check example:
let's say your application is hosted on two different availability zones on two different web servers what Route 53 can do is it can simultaneously check the health of these web servers it can like you know every one minute or five minutes It will send the request to the web servers and sees if this web server is active or not okay
Before going deep into understanding Amazon Route 53, We should be aware of some useful terminologies:
Internet Protocol (IP): It is a numerical label assigned to devices and used by computers to identify each other on a network.
Domain Registrars: When you want to own a specific domain name, you register it through a domain registrar. Registrars facilitate the process of acquiring, renewing, and transferring domain names. Popular domain registrars include GoDaddy, Namecheap, and Google Domains.
Root server: Root servers are DNS nameservers that operate in the root zone. These servers can directly answer queries for records stored or cached within the root zone, and they can also refer other requests to the appropriate Top Level Domain (TLD) server.
Top Level Domain: The TLD servers are the DNS server group one step below root servers in the DNS hierarchy, and they are an integral part of resolving DNS queries. Ex: .com, .NET, .in and .org.
What are the types of routing policies in Route 53?
Following are the types of routing policies in route53,
• Simple routing
• Latency routing
• Failover routing
• Geolocation routing
• Weighted routing
• Multivalue answer routing
Simple Routing: The Simple routing policy directs traffic to a single resource, such as an IP address or an Amazon S3 bucket, without any logic or decision-making.
Latency Routing: Imagine you have different doors to enter a building, and you direct people to the nearest door based on how crowded each one is. Latency routing works, similarly, sending users to the closest server for faster response times.
Failover Routing: Think of it as having a backup plan. If one server is down, it redirects users to another working server, ensuring your service is always available. It supports health checks.
Geolocation Routing: It routes traffic to the closest geographic location you are in
For example, if someone in Japan accesses your website, Geolocation Routing will guide them to a server in Asia for faster load times. If another user from the United States visits, it will point them to a server in North America. This ensures that no matter where your users are, they get a speedy and efficient experience tailored to their location
Weighted Routing: This is like distributing tasks among a group of friends. You can send more traffic to one server and less to another based on their capacity or priority. It supports health checks
Multivalue Answer Routing: Imagine asking a question and getting multiple answers. With this, you can return multiple IP addresses for a domain, and DNS will rotate through them, distributing traffic across various servers.
What is the relationship between Route53 and Cloud Front?
On the Cloud front, we will deliver content to edge locations, Route 53 for the Content Delivery Network. Additionally, if you are using Amazon CloudFront, you can configure Route 53 to route Internet traffic to those resources.
We can use three Health Check-Ups; they are
Health Check-Up that monitors on Endpoint (Monitor the Ec2 Instance)
Health Check-Up that monitors another health check-up
Health Check-Up that monitors CloudWatch Alarm (Ex: Alarm on RDS, Custom metrics, and other private Resources)
Limitation:
Maximum of 500 hosted zones and 10,000 Resource Record sets per hosted zone
50 Domains per AWS Account
100 value per Record
6 IP per Endpoint
6 IP per Address Rule
200 Active Health Check
How does the AWS Route 53 service work?
1. The domain name is first registered with AWS Route 53 or any Domain registrar, which is then configured to route Internet traffic to the servers hosting the domain name.
2. End-users enter the domain name or the complete URL into the browser search bar.
3. The ISP routes the request to a DNS resolver, a tool that converts the domain name into its IP address.
4. The DNS resolver then forwards the user request to a DNS root name server, which is then directed to its Top Level Domain (TLD) server and ultimately, to AWS Route 53.
5. The Route 53 authoritative name server returns the IP address of the domain name to the DNS resolver.
6. Now that the DNS resolver has the required IP address, it can forward the user request to the appropriate server hosting the content as per the configurations of the AWS Route 53 service.
Some Important Questions!
What are the differences between Route 53 and ELB?
Amazon Route 53 will handle DNS servers. Route 53 gives you a web interface through which the DNS can be managed using Route 53, it is possible to direct and failover traffic. This can be achieved by using the DNS Routing Policy.
One more routing policy is the Failover Routing policy. we set up a health check to monitor your application endpoints. If one of the endpoints is not available, Route 53 will automatically forward the traffic to other endpoints.
ELB automatically scales depending on the demand, so the sizing of the load balancers to handle more traffic effectively when it is not required.
How does Amazon Route 53 work?
Amazon Route 53 manages the DNS records for your domain, allowing you to associate domain names with resources such as EC2 instances, S3 buckets, and load balancers.
How can you route traffic to an AWS resource using Route 53?
To route traffic to an AWS resource, you create DNS records, such as A records for IPv4 addresses and Alias records for AWS resources like ELB, S3, and CloudFront distributions.
Alias Record: Point a hostname to AWS Resource
CName Record: Point a hostname to another hostname
Can Route 53 route traffic to non-AWS resources?
Yes, Route 53 can route traffic to resources outside of AWS by using the simple routing policy to direct traffic to IP addresses or domain names.
How can you ensure high availability using Route 53?
Route 53 provides health checks to monitor the health of resources and can automatically failover to healthy resources in case of failures.
What are health checks in Amazon Route 53?
Health checks in Route 53 monitor the health and availability of your resources by periodically sending requests and verifying the responses.
How can you configure a custom domain for an Amazon S3 bucket using Route 53?
You can create an Alias record in Route 53 that points to the static website hosting endpoint of the S3 bucket, allowing you to use a custom domain for your S3 bucket.
What is a DNS alias record?
An alias record is a Route 53-specific DNS record that allows you to route traffic directly to an AWS resource, such as an ELB, CloudFront distribution, or S3 bucket.
How can you migrate a domain to Amazon Route 53?
To migrate a domain to Route 53, you update your domain's DNS settings to use Route 53's name servers and then recreate your DNS records within the Route 53 console.
How does Route 53 support domain registration?
Route 53 allows you to register new domain names, manage existing domain names, and associate them with resources and services within your AWS account.
How can you use Route 53 to set up a global website?
You can use the Geolocation routing policy to route users to different resources based on their geographic location, creating a global website with reduced latency.
What is Route 53 Resolver?
Route 53 Resolver is a service that provides DNS resolution across Amazon VPCs and on-premises networks, enabling hybrid network configurations.