Tips & Tricks, Troubleshooting

Server’s DNS Address Could Not Be Found: How to Fix

The Domain Name Server aka Domain Name System is used to resolve domain names such as www.deepanshugahlaut.com (human-readable format) into IP addresses...

Written by Deepanshu Gahlaut · 3 min read >
changing dns address

The Domain Name Server aka Domain Name System is used to resolve domain names such as www.deepanshugahlaut.com (human-readable format) into IP addresses such as 23.229.178.193 (machine-readable format). It is a system that makes sure that you end up in the right place every time you type or request for a specific page. DNS also have other features and functions such as providing information about mail exchange with the domain.

Directly jump to one of the solutions to fix ‘DNS address could not be found error’ in your Chrome:

1. Flush DNS
2. Chrome net-internals Command
3. Change Your DNS Address
4. Restart the DNS Client Service
5. Add IP and Website in the Hosts file

There are many DNS providers such as Google, OpenDNS, Level3, DynDNS including your Internet Service Provider who carries the responsibility of resolving the domain name into the corresponding IP address.

If your DNS provider does not correctly resolve your domain name/URL, your browser can show you the error or blank page that you would not like to see. Recently, I’ve faced the same issue where Google Chrome was unable to perform DNS lookup for my domain and resulted in DNS_PROBE_FINISHED_NXDOMAIN error.

dns_probe_finished_nxdomain_error

It was a frustrating experience because I was making some important changes in the website. 🙁

If you’ve also faced the same problem, you can use one of these methods to solve “Server’s DNS Address Could Not Be Found” or “DNS_PROBE_FINISHED_NXDOMAIN” error.

Tip: You can always check the DNS server running on your computer by going to Command Prompt and typing ipconfig/all

1. Flush DNS

Operating Systems such as Windows XP/7/8/10 automatically store the IP addresses and DNS entries in order to facilitate the faster requests to the websites. If the DNS or IP address of a website is recently changed and not in the cache, you cannot access the website. You need to remove this cache by flushdns command in order to retrieve new and updated DNS records. Here is how you can:

Go to Command Prompt (cmd) and type following commands:

ipconfig /flushdns
ipconfig /registerdns
ipconfig /release
ipconfig /renew
NETSH winsock reset catalog
NETSH int ipv4 reset reset.log
NETSH int ipv6 reset reset.log
Exit

how-to-use-flushdns

2. Chrome net-internals Command

This command helps you identify the network data and related issues. Under DNS tab you can find the list of all hostnames, their IP family, IP address, and expiry date.

net-internals-chrome-cache

To fix the DNS issue, you need to clear this internal DNS cache saved by Google Chrome. Type chrome://net-internals/#dns and press the “Clear host cache” button.

clear host cache in chrome

This method worked best for me, and my website was live in Google Chrome again. 🙂

3. Change Your DNS Address

Your default DNS address is the address to your ISP’s DNS servers. However, sometimes the ISP’s DNS doesn’t resolve the URL or website you are looking for due to some bad settings or due to outdated records. Changing the DNS address value to Google DNS can speed up your browsing experience in a secure manner.

The Google Public DNS IP addresses (IPv4) are as follows:
8.8.8.8
8.8.4.4

The Google Public DNS IPv6 addresses are as follows:
2001:4860:4860::8888
2001:4860:4860::8844

Here is how you can change the DNS address in your system:

Step 1: Open Network and Sharing Center, and go to Change Adapter Settings. You will see all available network Connections.

network connection properties

Step 2: A new window will open. Click on Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4) and select Properties.
Step 3: Once you select the Properties, a new dialogue box will open, where you can enter the Google DNS server Addresses. Click OK.

changing dns address

Step 4: Restart your computer.

4. Restart the DNS Client Service

If you are still facing the issue, restarting the DNS client service in your computer can be helpful. This default service caches all DNS names and registers the full computer name for your computer. Here is how to restart it.

Step 1: Open Run and type services.msc

services-msc-command

Step 2: You will see all the local services running on your computer. Select DNS client service and click on Restart.

DNS client service in windows

Step 3: Restart this service.

Step 4: Restart your computer.

5. Add IP and Website in the Hosts file

If you are using Windows, the Hosts file is used to map host names to IP addresses. This file is used by your operating system in addressing network nodes in a computer network. It is basically a plain text file that resides in the Windows folder.

C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc

To edit the Hosts file, follow these steps:

Step 1: Go to C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc
Step 2: Open “hosts” file in Notepad. Rename it as “hosts.old”
Step 3: Now open the Hosts.old file. Make necessary changes to it, for example, I’ve added my domain and its IP address in the same format provided in the file.

edit hosts file in etc folder
Step 4: Save it as hosts in the same etc folder.
Step 5: Restart your computer.

Still facing the “Server’s DNS Address Could Not Be Found” issue? Or know a better solution to fix it? Please share in comments. I would love to hear you all.

Written by Deepanshu Gahlaut
I write on SEO, content marketing, latest technologies, and social media. You can find me online, or at home watching sci-fi movies, listening songs, or sleeping. In addition, my latest obsession is creating, collecting and organizing visual content on my new blog - Infopixi, to help bloggers, marketers, and businesses. Profile

30 Replies to “Server’s DNS Address Could Not Be Found: How to Fix”

  1. I have tried all the ways that many people give on the internet, but it still does not work, what’s the solution

  2. Thanks very much. I tried the first 3 suggestions and eventually changing the DNS address was the winner.

  3. Thanks so much for the solutions given and sharing it. It worked on my win7 desktop pc. Great job!

  4. thanks man…changing the google dns did it for me! and its a 1 minute fix too. i tried the cmd part but nothing happened so i moved on to the next and then i got it.

  5. hi, I m facing same problem (server DNS address could not be found) but getting “expires” under this.. hosting has been expired or some other issue? i have tried many solutions but could not open this site. please solve.

    1. This is because Google Public DNS is a free, global DNS resolution and caching service which does not perform any blocking or filtering of any kind, so, most of the time, there will be no “server DNS address could not be found” error for your website. Plus, it is one of the best DNS resolution services with high-speed, better-security, up-to-date index and validity of results.

      Hope that helps.

  6. When i try to open my network setting it shows errors occurred and it does not open. And i have problem of not accessing some sites on my laptop and it shows DNS could not found.

  7. Thanks for this informative post. My server DNS address problem solved by method 5 of hosts etc files.

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