Problem

What is a "AAAA" record?

Solution

An AAAA record (or quad-A record) represents an IPv6 address. The format for an AAAA record is very similar to an A record.

• Name - The host name of the record (e.g. www)
• TTL - The time of live, if not specified the default for the zone will be used
• IPv6 Address - Indicates the IPv6 address which this record is mapped to.

IPv6 addresses use eight groups of four hexidecimal digits, separated by colons.

For example: 2001:0db8:85a3:0000:0000:8a2e:0370:7334

Whats the difference between an AAAA record and an A record?

Both AAAA and A records are equally important when it comes to resolving DNS queries, however the difference is that an AAAA record resolves IPv6 Addresses and an A record resolves IPv4 addresses.

If your host device only has an IPv6 address then you only need an AAAA record.  If the host has bound to it both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses then you would use both A and AAAA records.

Can a host name have both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses?

Yes. You have an A record (for IPv4) and an AAAA record (for IPv6). Typically the AAAA record gets resolved first, then the A record.