DNS Failure is a network error in which RankGear could not translate a host name into an IP address, so the request never reached the target server.
| Term | DNS Failure |
|---|---|
| Category | APIs, Reliability and Publishing |
| Also known as | ERR_NAME_NOT_RESOLVED, Name Resolution Failure |
| Where it appears | Activity log and batch retry |
What it means in RankGear
DNS Failure shows up in the Activity log and during batch retry when a crawl, API call, or publishing request fails at the name-resolution step. Before RankGear can fetch a URL or reach a remote endpoint, the host name has to resolve to an address; a DNS failure means that lookup returned nothing usable, so no connection was ever attempted. RankGear logs it separately from timeouts and HTTP responses precisely because the request never touched a server — the point of failure is the name, not the destination.
How to interpret it
Read the visible status, the diagnostics, and the retry decision together to separate a transient blip from a real configuration problem. A single DNS failure against a host that is otherwise reachable is usually transient — a flaky resolver or a brief network interruption — and worth one bounded retry. A failure that repeats for every request to the same host almost always points at configuration: a mistyped domain, a private or internal name that public DNS cannot resolve, or an endpoint that no longer exists. Because a name that will not resolve can never connect, retrying an invalid target only spends attempts with no chance of success.
| What you see | Likely cause | Retry? |
|---|---|---|
| One host fails once; other hosts are fine | Transient resolver or network blip | Yes — one bounded retry |
| Every request to one host fails; others succeed | Wrong or nonexistent host name | No — fix the target address |
| All hosts fail at the same time | Local network or DNS resolver outage | Wait, then re-run the batch |
Example
A scheduled batch is set to publish to a staging site whose subdomain was entered as stagng.example.com instead of staging.example.com. Every request to that host records a DNS Failure in the Activity log while requests to the live domain keep succeeding. Rather than burning repeated attempts on a name that will never resolve, RankGear stops retrying the bad target — the fix is correcting the address, not trying again.
Important considerations
- A DNS failure means the request never reached a server, so it tells you nothing about whether the target page or endpoint is healthy — only that its name could not be resolved.
- Keep it distinct from timeouts and HTTP 5xx errors: those reach a server and fail there, while a DNS failure fails before any connection, and the two call for different responses.
- Credentials and remote publishing targets deserve care — connection tests should be read-only where possible, and secrets must stay redacted in the log.
- This is a reliability signal about network conditions and configuration, not a ranking or quality signal; it reflects nothing about a page’s SEO or its standing in search.
Related terms
Part of the RankGear glossary · how RankGear measures · the 870 factors.