Learn what subdomains are appropriate to proxy through Cloudflare via the orange and gray-cloud icons in the Cloudflare DNS app.
Overview
Beside most A, AAAA, and CNAME records in the Cloudflare DNS app are the following proxy options:
- An orange-cloud icon proxies traffic for the subdomain through Cloudflare.
- A gray-cloud icon does not proxy traffic for the subdomain through Cloudflare.
Understand how Cloudflare works with orange-clouded DNS records.
Traffic proxied to Cloudflare utilizes various Cloudflare security and performance features. Cloudflare only proxies traffic for A, AAAA, and CNAME records. However, not all A, AAAA, and CNAME records are appropriate to proxy through Cloudflare. To decide which records to proxy, identify the type of traffic for each of your subdomains. Enable Cloudflare for any subdomain that hosts web traffic on ports 80 or 443 unless you utilize Cloudflare Spectrum.
If using another CDN provider with Cloudflare, ensure the CNAME record for the CDN provider is added in your Cloudflare DNS app.
By default, Cloudflare only proxies HTTP traffic. If you need to connect to your origin using another protocol (SSH, FTP, SMTP, etc.), do one of the following:
- grey-cloud your DNS record,
- connect directly to the origin web server’s IP address, or
- use Cloudflare Spectrum.
autodiscover | calendar | chat | cPanel | cvs |
e | exchange | ftp | game | |
gameserver | git | imap | irc | |
local | localhost | mobilemail | mx | |
panel | pda | pop | repo | secure |
sftp | sites | smtp | ssh | ssl |
stream | streaming | svn | vid | video |
vids | vpn | webmail | webstats |