When you upgrade to Jottings Pro, one of the features you get is custom domain support. You can take your site at mysite.jottings.me and point it to your own domain—blog.example.com, or thoughts.yourname.com, or whatever you own.
But here's the constraint: one custom domain per site. That's it.
You can't have blog.example.com and thoughts.example.com pointing to the same Jottings site. You can't have multiple domain aliases. One domain. One site.
I know what you're thinking: "That seems limiting. Why would I want that?"
Fair question. And the answer gets at something I think matters a lot about how I build things.
Why Constraints Exist
Most software problems come from trying to do too much.
Think about any platform you've used that felt bloated. Squarespace. WordPress. Even Medium. They all started simple, then added features. Multi-site support. Domain aliasing. Redirect rules. URL forwarding. A hundred configuration options.
Each feature was added because someone wanted it. None of them were bad on their own.
But together? They create complexity.
More features = more state to manage = more edge cases = more things that break = a product that serves everyone equally badly instead of someone well.
The one-domain constraint is different. It's a deliberate choice to keep Jottings simple.
When you have one custom domain per site, the system is easier to understand. Your site has one identity. One URL where it lives. If you want a second domain, you create a second site.
That sounds harsh. But it's actually clarity.
The Alternative: A Mess
Let me paint the alternative. Imagine if Jottings let you attach unlimited domains to a single site.
Your site at mysite.jottings.me could be accessed via:
blog.example.comthoughts.example.commusings.another-domain.com- An old domain you used to own
- Three variations because you're not sure which one people have bookmarked
Now multiply that across users. Thousands of people, each with multiple domains pointing to the same site.
The problems start piling up:
SEO nightmare: Search engines see multiple URLs with identical content. Which one do you want to rank? Google has to guess. You get split authority. Your site ranks worse.
Cache confusion: Is blog.example.com/about the same as mysite.jottings.me/about? From a caching perspective, they're different URLs. Your CDN has to think about this. Complexity creeps in.
Broken redirects: One domain is your old domain. You want it to redirect—but where? To the primary domain? Then you need redirect rules. Suddenly you're managing a redirect matrix. thoughts.example.com/old-post should go to blog.example.com/old-post. But wait, should it preserve that URL, or should it canonicalize to your primary domain? Now you're building redirect logic.
Verification headaches: When you add a domain to Jottings, we verify you own it via DNS records. With multiple domains per site, users have to manage multiple verifications. They have to debug "why isn't this domain working?" multiple times.
User confusion: When someone creates a site and attaches three domains, six months later they've forgotten which domain is which. Support tickets: "Why is my blog on that domain?" Navigation becomes confusing. "Which URL should I share?"
Each of these problems is solvable in isolation. But together, they make the product harder to use and harder to build.
One Domain, One Site
The constraint simplifies everything.
Your Jottings site has one home. One identity. One URL you own and control.
If you want a second blog or second domain, you create a second Jottings site. Your account can have multiple sites. Each one is independent. Each one has its own subdomain at jottings.me and can have its own custom domain.
This is cleaner. Not just for us, but for you too.
You know exactly what you're managing. You don't have to think about which domain is "primary." You don't have to wonder about SEO cannibalization. You don't have to debug redirect rules or manage multiple DNS records pointing to the same site.
It's straightforward. One site. One domain. One source of truth.
What About Your Old Domain?
Here's the question that usually comes next: "What if I had a blog on an old domain and I want to move to Jottings?"
Good scenario. And it's completely supported.
When you move to a Jottings custom domain, your old domain can become a parking page that redirects to your new domain. You can set that up yourself with a simple HTTP redirect on your old hosting.
Or, if you have multiple old domains and want them all to point to one Jottings site, you still can—at the domain level. You point all your old domains to redirect to your primary Jottings domain.
That redirect happens at the DNS/domain level, not in Jottings. We don't manage it. Your domain registrar does. And that's the right place for it to live anyway.
The beauty of this approach is that it's portable. You're not locked into Jottings' redirect system. You're not dependent on us to manage that infrastructure. You control your domains.
Jottings is responsible for one thing: your site lives at the custom domain you point at it. What happens to your old domain is your call.
Constraints Are Features
This is the broader principle I think about when building Jottings.
Every constraint is a feature if it makes the core experience better.
Static site generation limits you to a 10-30 second publish delay instead of real-time updates. That constraint makes your site faster, more secure, and cheaper to run.
Subdomains at jottings.me limit you to a namespace instead of full domain ownership. That constraint makes subdomain registration instant and friction-free.
One custom domain per site limits you to one identity per site. That constraint makes the system simpler for everyone.
The platforms that confuse me are the ones that try to be everything. The ones with hundreds of configuration options. The ones that'll let you do basically anything—which is why nobody can figure out how to do what they want.
Constraints create clarity. They force decisions. They make it obvious what the system is for and how to use it.
Jottings is for writers who want to own their platform. One site. One voice. One place on the internet that's yours.
If you need five blogs on five domains with custom redirect rules and DNS forwarding and domain aliasing, maybe Jottings isn't for you. And that's okay. Use WordPress. Or Squarespace. Or build it yourself.
But if you want a blogging platform that's simple, that respects your ownership, that gives you clarity instead of options—Jottings is built for you.
One domain. One site. One identity.
Try It Out
Want to see how this works? Start with a free Jottings site at yourname.jottings.me. Publish some posts. See if you like it.
When you're ready to claim your own domain, upgrade to Pro. Add your custom domain. No complicated redirects. No configuration matrix. Just your site, living where you own it.