How to Install CoreDNS on Windows 10

CoreDNS is a DNS server that can be used to translate human-readable domain names into IP addresses. In this tutorial, we will guide you on how to install CoreDNS on Windows 10.

Prerequisites

To install CoreDNS on Windows 10, you will need the following prerequisites:

  • A Windows 10 computer with administrative privileges.
  • A text editor of your choice.
  • A web browser to download CoreDNS and verify the installation.

Step 1: Download CoreDNS

To download CoreDNS, open a web browser and navigate to https://coredns.io/. Then, click on the "Download" button in the top-right corner of the page.

CoreDNS Download Page

On the next page, scroll down and click on the "Windows" link to download the Windows version of CoreDNS.

CoreDNS Windows Download

Once the download is complete, extract the contents of the downloaded archive to a suitable location.

Step 2: Configure CoreDNS

Once you have downloaded and extracted CoreDNS, it's time to configure it. For this, you will need to create a configuration file. Using a text editor of your choice, create a file named "Corefile" (without quotes) and save it in the same directory where you extracted CoreDNS.

You can use the following configuration as a starting point:

. {
    forward . 8.8.8.8:53
}

This configuration instructs CoreDNS to forward all DNS requests to Google's DNS server at 8.8.8.8.

Step 3: Start the CoreDNS Service

To start the CoreDNS service, open a Command Prompt window with administrative privileges. Then, navigate to the directory where you extracted CoreDNS and run the following command:

./coredns.exe

This will start the CoreDNS service and it will begin listening for DNS requests on port 53.

Step 4: Verify the Installation

To verify that CoreDNS is working correctly, open a web browser and try visiting a website, such as https://google.com. If the website loads correctly, then CoreDNS is working as expected.

You can also use a tool such as nslookup to verify the DNS resolution. Open a Command Prompt window and run the following command:

nslookup google.com localhost

If the DNS resolution is successful, then you should see the IP address of Google's server.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, we have shown you how to install CoreDNS on Windows 10. Once installed, CoreDNS can be used to resolve DNS requests on your local network. If you have any questions or run into any issues, please refer to the official CoreDNS documentation.