Point your domain from GoDaddy nameservers to Bluehost
Nameservers decide which company gets asked for your DNS records. Changing them hands over the whole zone in one move — website, email, subdomains and verification records all switch to the new provider's answers at the same moment.
That makes this the highest-consequence step on the page and also the fastest to perform. It is two fields and a save button. Everything that makes it safe happens beforehand.
Which side you change it on depends on where the domain is registered. Still at GoDaddy? Change it in the Domain Portfolio. Already transferred to Bluehost? Change it in the Bluehost portal. Both are covered below.
- Hands-on time
- 10 minutes to change
- Start to finish
- 24–48 hours to propagate fully
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Steps
- 6
Downtime risk: High if the target zone is not ready. This is the moment the switch actually flips for the public.
Check this first
Do you actually need to change nameservers at all?
Often not. Nameservers decide who manages your DNS, which is a separate question from where the website is hosted. If you are moving hosting to Bluehost but are happy for GoDaddy to keep answering DNS, leave the nameservers alone and change one A record. That also sidesteps the fact that Bluehost has no zone-file import.
The short version — 5 minutes instead of 48 hours
- 1Ask what you actually want: a website on a different server, or a different company managing DNS?
- 2If it is only the website, edit the A record at GoDaddy and stop here.
- 3If your DNS is at a third party such as Cloudflare, that is where the A record lives — neither GoDaddy nor Bluehost is involved.
- 4Only if you want Bluehost managing the zone should you continue with the nameserver change below.
Not what you need? If you are closing the GoDaddy account entirely and your nameservers point at GoDaddy, you cannot skip this — the DNS service is going away with the account, so the zone has to move.
Can I do just this, and nothing else?
Yes — this works on its own
Technically yes, but this is the one task that is never really "just" one task. It hands the entire zone to Bluehost in a single move, so every record has to already exist there. If your goal is only to move the website, change the A record at GoDaddy instead — smaller change, none of the email risk.
What changes
- Bluehost answers every DNS question for the domain, not just the website ones
- Email, subdomains and verification records all resolve from Bluehost's zone
What stays exactly as it is
- The domain stays registered wherever it is now — this is not a registrar transfer
- Website files are not moved by this step
- GoDaddy's zone remains intact and unedited, which is what makes rollback instant
Before doing nameservers on its own: Every DNS record must already exist at Bluehost — or, given Bluehost only exposes zone editing once its nameservers are in use, be written down ready to enter the moment the switch lands.
Before you start
- The DNS records already rebuilt at Bluehost, or written down ready to enter immediately
- TTLs lowered at GoDaddy at least a day earlier, if you want a fast correction path
- The website already tested on Bluehost, if the host is moving too
Step-by-step
Each step is labelled with which side you are working on, so you always know whether you should be signed in to GoDaddy or Bluehost.
- 1At Bluehost
Confirm what Bluehost's nameservers are
Bluehost publishes one fixed pair for shared hosting, which makes this simpler than the reverse direction — GoDaddy assigns a different numbered pair per domain.
- VPS and dedicated plans can use private nameservers instead, which are specific to your account
- If your Bluehost account shows a different pair in its own dashboard, use that
Bluehost nameserversns1.bluehost.com ns2.bluehost.com - 2At GoDaddy
Change the nameservers at GoDaddy
If the domain is still registered at GoDaddy, this happens in the Domain Portfolio — the registrar controls the delegation regardless of who provides the hosting.
- Sign in to your GoDaddy Domain Portfolio and select the domain
- Open DNS, then Nameservers, then Change
- Choose "I'll use my own nameservers" and enter the Bluehost pair
- Save, and expect the change to be visible within 24–48 hours
ReplacingnsNN.domaincontrol.com → ns1.bluehost.com nsNN+1.domaincontrol.com → ns2.bluehost.com - 3At Bluehost
Or change them at Bluehost, if the domain already moved
Once the registrar transfer has completed, the delegation is controlled from the Bluehost portal instead.
- Bluehost portal → Domains → select the domain → Nameservers tab
- Click Change Nameservers, enter the values and Save
- Allow 24 to 48 hours for propagation
- 4At Bluehost
Enter the DNS records immediately
Because Bluehost exposes zone editing only for domains on its nameservers, the window right after the switch is when you finish the zone. Have every record ready before you save the nameserver change, not after.
- Work from the GoDaddy zone export you took earlier
- MX records first — email is the thing whose absence nobody notices until it is expensive
- Then A, CNAME, SPF, DKIM, DMARC and any verification TXT records
- 5On your computer
Watch propagation rather than guessing at it
Check what resolvers around the world actually return. Do not rely on your own browser, which caches aggressively and will mislead you in both directions.
- whatsmydns.net shows resolution from multiple locations at once
- Expect a mixed picture for a while — some resolvers on the old answer, some on the new. That is normal
Check the delegationdig NS example.com +short dig @8.8.8.8 example.com A +short dig +trace example.com - 6At Bluehost
Re-issue SSL once the domain resolves to Bluehost
Certificate issuance validates by checking that the domain points at the requesting server, so it can only succeed after propagation. Until then, expect certificate warnings.
- Provision or renew the certificate in Bluehost once dig returns the new IP
- Confirm the site still redirects HTTP to HTTPS afterwards
- Check that a stale CAA record is not blocking issuance
What goes wrong
The failures that actually happen on this step, rather than a generic warning to be careful.
Bluehost's zone editor only appears after the switch
Can cause downtimeThis is the awkward part of moving in this direction. You cannot fully stage the zone in advance the way you can when moving to a provider that lets you build a zone before delegating to it. Treat the nameserver change and the record entry as one operation performed back to back, with everything written down first.
You cannot shorten nameserver propagation with TTLs
Can cause delaysLowering the TTL on your A and MX records genuinely speeds up record changes. It does not speed up a nameserver change: the delegation TTL is set by the TLD registry — typically 48 hours for .com — and is not yours to adjust. Plan for the full window rather than expecting your TTL work to cover it.
Changing nameservers moves email too, whether you meant it to or not
Can cause downtimePeople change nameservers to move a website and are surprised when mail stops. The nameservers determine the whole zone, MX records included. If email is staying where it is, its MX records still need to exist in the new zone.
Both zones stay live during propagation
Can cause downtimeFor a day or two, some visitors reach the old host and some reach the new one. If both can accept form submissions, orders or comments, you will end up with data split across two databases. For an ecommerce site, put the old one in maintenance mode at cutover.
Half-changed nameserver pairs
Can cause delaysEntering the new primary and leaving the old secondary produces intermittent, maddening behaviour — resolvers get different answers depending on which nameserver they happen to ask. Replace the whole set at once.
How to check it worked
Do not rely on the site looking fine in your own browser — it caches, and it will tell you what you want to hear.
- dig NS example.com +short returns only the new nameservers
- dig @8.8.8.8 example.com A +short returns the new hosting IP
- whatsmydns.net shows consistent results across most global locations
- The site loads over HTTPS with a valid certificate, without a warning
- A test email to the domain arrives, confirming MX survived the switch
If it goes wrong
Set the nameservers back to the GoDaddy pair the domain was using. GoDaddy's zone is unchanged and immediately correct again — though you wait out propagation a second time, which is the real cost of getting this wrong.
Questions about this step
What are Bluehost's nameservers?
ns1.bluehost.com and ns2.bluehost.com for shared hosting. VPS and dedicated accounts can use private nameservers specific to the account, in which case use the pair shown in your own dashboard.
What are GoDaddy's nameservers?
GoDaddy assigns a numbered pair per domain in the form nsNN.domaincontrol.com and nsNN+1.domaincontrol.com. There is no single universal pair, so if you ever need to switch back, take the values from your own account rather than an article.
Do I need to change nameservers if I only transferred the registrar?
No, and you should not. A registrar transfer preserves the existing nameserver settings, which is what keeps your site up during the transfer. Change them only when you actually want a different provider answering DNS.
Why does my site still show the old version?
Almost always your own browser or your ISP's resolver still holding the previous answer. Check with dig against a public resolver such as 8.8.8.8 before concluding anything is wrong — that tells you what the internet sees, rather than what your laptop remembers.
Reference documentation
Provider interfaces change. When these steps and the official documentation disagree, the documentation wins.
Only if you are doing the full move
Stuck on this step?
Send me the domain and what you have tried. I do GoDaddy to Bluehost moves regularly and can tell you what is actually blocking it.