What are Smart Records?
A or AAAA records can be optionally configured as Smart Records in the advanced settings panel. This is achieved by configuring a Smart Record Type and selecting either a geographic or latency region. Smart Records allow Bunny DNS to respond to queries dynamically based on the DNS query, or the end user's location.
If a record is not part of a DNS set with multiple values for the same domain, Smart Records will act just like normal records.
For billing purposes, scriptable records also count as Smart Records but are not otherwise related.
Understanding Geographic Records
Geographic records will route the query based on the geographical location of the end user. In a record set, the end-users location will be evaluated against all other records in the set and the record with the closest range to the end-user will be returned. This allows you to configure global load balancing for servers located around the world and ensure end users are connecting to a server closest to them.
To determine the location of the end user, multiple signals are used such as the location of the Bunny DNS resolving server, query remote IP, or the EDNS0 IP provided by the query to provide the most accurate results.
Understanding Latency Records
Latency records will route the query based on the estimated latency of the end user, to the latency of the selected bunny.net datacenter region. In a record set, the user's country code and state will be evaluated to determine the estimated latency towards all of the configured records. The end user will then be routed to the record with the lowest assumed latency based on billions of real user latency tests.
This allows you to configure routing based on latency towards specific regions. To get accurate matching, the bunny.net region closest to your own server should be selected.
Latency vs Geographic Records
Latency records are easier to configure and might be more accurate than geographic routing since geographical distance might not always translate into latency. However, different network providers might have different network routing that might impact this differently for your specific records. We suggest selecting one based on your specific requirements and tests.
Understanding Smart Records And Load Balancing
To understand how Smart Records are used to achieve global load balancing, please check the Understanding Bunny DNS Load Balancing article.