DNS Infrastructure Compared: Cloudflare DNS vs Route 53 vs Azure DNS vs Google Cloud DNS

Yes. Cloudflare's authoritative DNS hosting is free for unlimited domains and unlimited queries on all plans, including the free tier. There are no per-zone or per-query charges. This is subsidized by Cloudflare's paid products (CDN, WAF, Workers, Zero Trust). The only DNS-related paid features are advanced load balancing (/month per health check) and certain enterprise routing features.

CNAME flattening allows you to use a CNAME record at the zone apex (e.g., example.com without www) by resolving it to an A/AAAA record at query time. Standard DNS prohibits CNAME records at the zone apex because they conflict with SOA and NS records. Cloudflare provides CNAME flattening on all records. AWS Route 53 offers Alias records (similar concept but limited to AWS resources). Azure has Alias record sets. Google Cloud DNS does not support this feature.

Route 53 has more mature built-in health checking and DNS failover. Health checks can monitor HTTP endpoints, TCP connections, and even other health checks in calculated configurations. Failover routing is native to Route 53 at no extra cost beyond health check fees (/bin/sh.50-0.75/month per check). Cloudflare offers health checking through its Load Balancing add-on (/month per origin), which is more expensive per-check but includes global load balancing and traffic steering.

Yes. When you set a DNS record to DNS-only mode (grey cloud icon in the dashboard), Cloudflare acts as a pure authoritative DNS provider — traffic goes directly to your origin without passing through Cloudflare's proxy. You get Cloudflare's fast DNS resolution without CDN, WAF, or DDoS proxy features. Many organizations use Cloudflare for DNS even when they do not want proxy features for certain subdomains.

Cloudflare offers one-click DNSSEC activation — Cloudflare manages the key generation, signing, and rotation automatically. Route 53 supports DNSSEC but requires you to manage KSK rotation (or enable automatic key rotation). Azure DNS has DNSSEC in preview with limited support. Google Cloud DNS supports DNSSEC with automated key management. Cloudflare's implementation is the simplest by a significant margin.

Cloudflare DNS is well-suited for multi-cloud because it is cloud-agnostic — it works equally well with AWS, Azure, GCP, or any other origin. Route 53, Azure DNS, and Google Cloud DNS all have features (alias records, private DNS zones) that work best within their own ecosystems. If you want a single DNS layer that spans multiple clouds without bias toward any one provider, Cloudflare is the natural choice.

These are two different products. 1.1.1.1 is a public recursive DNS resolver — it is what your devices use to look up any domain on the internet (competing with Google's 8.8.8.8). Cloudflare DNS hosting is an authoritative DNS service — it is where you host your domain's DNS records so that resolvers (including 1.1.1.1) can find your servers. You can use either one independently of the other.

No. Azure DNS is a DNS hosting service only. You must register your domain with a separate registrar (GoDaddy, Namecheap, Cloudflare Registrar, etc.) and then point the nameservers to Azure DNS. AWS Route 53 and Cloudflare both offer integrated domain registration. Google offers domain registration through Cloud Domains (formerly Google Domains).

Google Cloud DNS was the first major DNS provider to offer a 100% uptime SLA. Cloudflare offers a 100% uptime SLA on Enterprise plans and provides high availability on all plans (though the formal SLA varies by tier). Route 53 offers a 100% availability SLA. Azure DNS offers a 100% availability SLA. In practice, all four providers are extremely reliable, and DNS outages at this tier are rare.