Redirect a Subdomain to Tumblr

Let’s say that you’ve registered a domain with Reclaim Hosting, and you’ve mapped that domain to to your Wordpress website. Now, maybe you’re interested in pulling data from an outside source onto your website while still using your domain. This is done using subdomains.

Create a Subdomain

The idea is fairly simple: create a subdomain, then redirect that subdomain to the outside source that you’d like to pull in.

For purposes of this article, let’s look at mapping your subdomain to your Tumblr 3 website. Start by logging into your cPanel, and clicking on Subdomains under the Domains section of your cPanel dashboard.

From there, you’re going to want to create a subdomain.

• Type the subdomain that you want in box 1.
• Click anywhere outside of box 1 and you’ll see box 3 automatically fill itself in.
• If you have multiple domains registered, use the dropdown menu in box 2 to select the correct domain.
• Click Create.

You’ll be taken to a page that says “Success: “tumblr.yourdomain.com ” has been created.” Click Go Back. Scroll down a click Manage Direction of the subdomain that you’ve just created.

Add in Redirection

Type in the web address of your Tumblr site and click save.

As a final step, test out the redirection by typing in your recently created subdomain into your web browser.

Connect Using DNS Records

Tumblr offers the option to use a custom Top Level Domain with your account. Whether you’re using a subdomain (like tumblr.meredithfierro.com) or a root domain (meredithfierro.com 1) you can use DNS records to connect your domain to your Tumblr.

Tumblr has this documented here: Custom domains – Help Center, but I’ll walk you through how to set up the DNS records in cPanel.

First, you’ll log in to your account. Then navigate to the DNS Zone Editor:

Top Level Domain

If you’re going to use a top level domain, you’ll want to create an A Record to connect the domain to Tumblr. When you hosting account is created, an A record is created to point your domain to your specific server. We’ll need to change this A record to point to Tumblr. Click Manage.

The A record should be on of the first records in the list. Click edit:

Then you’ll change the IP 66.6.44.4 to your domain. Click Save Record when you’re done:

Using a Subdomain

If you’re going to use a subdomain to connect to Tumblr, we’ll need to make a CNAME Record. Click CNAME Record.

Then you’ll add whatever subdomain you decide to use, I’m using tumblr.meredithfierro.com in this case. You’ll create a record to point to domains.tumblr.com 

Click Add a CNAME Record once you’re ready to add the domain.

And that’s it! It can take up to 24 hours for the DNS to take hold so if the site doesn’t load right away, keep that in mind.