Setting up a custom domain with Heroku and namecheap - ruby-on-rails

Question

I've followed all the instructions on https://devcenter.heroku.com/articles/custom-domains to get my custom domain set up, and it still isn't working.
On Heroku, I have the following domains:
myapp.herokuapp.com
example.com
www.example.com
And on Namecheap, I have the following settings:
HOST NAME | IP ADDRESS/URL | RECORD TYPE
# http://example.com URL Redirect
www myapp.herokuapp.com. CNAME(Alias)
When I run: "host www.example.com" in my terminal, I expect to get "www.example.com is an alias for myapp.herokuapp.com". Instead, I get:
"www.example.com is an alias for myapp.heroku.com"
I can't figure out why it is pointing to myapp.heroku.com, because I have only specified myapp.herokuapps.com.
Does anybody know why this is happening?

Answer 1

Update note: Heroku and Namecheap change their interfaces every so often. This answer may have outdated screenshots, but it will be updated over time. See these updates below.
I've just done this myself so I thought I'd chime in as the answer doesn't illustrate how to get both www.example.org and example.org working. Heroku also changed its admin interface a bit.
Namecheap
First, login to Namecheap.
Go to Domain List and click "Manage" for the domain you're configuring.
Set both record types to CNAME (Alias) and enter your <name>.herokuapp.com in both url-boxes (# and www).
(PS: If they're not there, click the "Add new record" and add them there.)
Next, head over to Heroku
Login and choose your project from the list. For this example, we're choosing the "Lakka" project.
On the project page, click Settings
Scroll down and find the Add domain section
Enter your example.org and click Save.
Click the button again, and input your www.example.org and click Save.
That's it, You're done! Now when you enter example.org or www.example.org in your browser, both will show your Heroku project.
In this example, http://lakka.herokuapp.com would be accessible (after DNSes update) also on http://lakkatracker.com and http://www.lakkatracker.com.
(If you want to redirect traffic from www.example.org to example.org, which is a good practise, you can use the record type "URL (Redirect)" for the www host name)
It can take some time before your DNSs recognize the changes. You can try using a proxy for testing, like Anonymouse, if your changes aren't reflected immediately.

Answer 2

1) Go To Namecheap, and go to the domain you want to manage.
2) On the left sidebar, click "All Record Hosts", NOT any of the other jazz other tutorials tell you. No DNS pointing changes are necessary. It's easier to use alias.
3) Once you do, you'll see a line starting with "www" as a CNAME (Alias) option. Fill this in as your heroku app's domain name example.herokuapp.com
That's it for namecheap.
4) Then at heroku settings, under "domains", enter your purchased domain name you wish to be displayed.
That's it!
It's as easy as letting heroku and namecheap know about both domain aliases.
Credits to this blog:
http://blog.romansanchez.me/2013/06/08/point-namecheap-domain-to-heroku/
Update:
Apparently, heroku will only allow sites with www. prepended. To have a true root domain without www. will take some extra ninja hacking.

Answer 3

Namecheap updated its interface. New screenshots to supplement other good answers:

Answer 4

If you want all the traffic to point to http://example.com then do this:
and set both example.com and www.example.com in Heroku settings.
Then test everything by using http://anonymouse.org

Answer 5

Set up a namecheap config that looks like this:
And a heroku config that looks like this:
And you're good to go!

Answer 6

Depending on your application, it may be a result of not using an SSL certificate. If you are trying to use an SNI SSL on the free dyno it is not going to work. In my case, I upgraded to hobby dyno and it immediately worked via the ACM.

Answer 7

Here are 2 possibilities,
You had previously pointed the DNS records to myapp.heroku.com and the changes haven't propagated yet
This could be an artifact of the change Heroku made move apps from the heroku.com domain to the herokuapp.com domain, but I'm unsure of how this could happen or why it would happen for you; records for my apps all point directly to herokuapp.com, but I'm not using NameCheap.
You could try registering a different (free) domain with an entity like .tk to see if this is specific to NameCheap.

Answer 8

I linked a namecheap domain to my Heroku app today and it is now a bit different, so here is what I did.
Add the domain (purchased on namecheap) to your Heroku app like www.example.com. The 'www' is important. Copy the generated xxx.herokudns.com link.
Now go to your domain settings on namecheap. Click on Advanced DNS.
Add the following two records:
Type: CNAME Record, Host: www, Value: the copied URL from step 1.
Type: URL Redirect Record, Host: #, Value: http://www.example.com
Save and maybe you have to wait for up to 30 minutes.

Answer 9

I couldn't get both www.example.com and example.com to work, so one of the workarounds I found was to set the CNAME and # to www., and then on the Domain tab, set "Redirect Doman" from example.com to www.example.com.