2026-04-29 / 1 min read
Cloudflare, Vercel, and the front door
A clean website migration is mostly about the front door: DNS, redirects, certificates, headers, analytics, and the ability to roll back without panic.
The public website is a front door. People notice the design first, but the door also has locks, signage, hinges, lighting, and a way to get back inside if something jams.
For RADLAB, the clean architecture is simple:
- IONOS keeps registrar duties
- Cloudflare keeps DNS and zone-level controls
- Vercel hosts the Next.js application
- DNS records for the Vercel app stay aligned with Vercel's domain requirements
That separation keeps each tool doing what it is best at. Cloudflare owns the zone and security posture. Vercel owns the app deploy, previews, framework integration, analytics, and production hosting.
The launch checklist matters because DNS mistakes are boring until they are expensive. Snapshot the old records. Verify SSL before traffic moves. Check canonical URLs, sitemap, robots, headers, 404 behavior, and page performance after cutover.
The best migration is the one readers barely notice.