NetBox’s position as the network source of truth continues to strengthen, and as our community grows, so does the demand for integrations with critical infrastructure services. Today, we’re announcing the Private Preview of our latest integration: a direct connection between NetBox and Microsoft DNS.
Microsoft DNS is one of the most widely deployed DNS solutions in enterprise environments, serving as the backbone for name resolution across countless organizations. Users have requested a more streamlined way to integrate NetBox with Microsoft DNS to maintain synchronization between IP addressing and DNS records. This integration helps network teams ensure consistency across their network documentation and name resolution systems, reducing the risks of manual data entry and the overhead of maintaining multiple sources of truth.
The Challenge of Managing DNS and IPAM Separately
For many network teams, NetBox serves as the authoritative source for IP Address Management (IPAM), while Microsoft DNS handles name resolution. Without a direct connection between these systems, teams often face:
- Manual duplication of data leading to inconsistencies between DNS records and IPAM
- Troubleshooting delays caused by mismatched records
- Increased operational overhead when provisioning new services
- Difficulty auditing DNS records against the network’s source of truth
This integration addresses these challenges by creating a link between NetBox and Microsoft DNS, ensuring that name resolution data is accurately reflected in your network documentation.
Building Towards a Shared Authority Model
Like our recently announced integrations with Microsoft DHCP, Cisco Catalyst Center, and AWS VPC IPAM, this Microsoft DNS integration is part of our vision for a shared authority model. In the initial release, the integration will focus on a one-way synchronization that imports DNS data from Microsoft DNS into NetBox, enhancing visibility across your network management stack.
We’re starting with this “data in” approach to ensure that NetBox provides comprehensive visibility of your DNS infrastructure, bringing Microsoft DNS records into your central source of truth. As the integration matures, we plan to develop bi-directional synchronization capabilities that will allow changes to flow in both directions, supporting the shared authority model where each system handles its specialty while maintaining synchronization.
This approach ensures that NetBox remains the central source of truth for network infrastructure documentation, while Microsoft DNS efficiently manages name resolution services. Even in this initial one-way sync, the integration helps reduce configuration drift, improves visibility, and enables better coordination between network and infrastructure teams.
Key Features in the Private Preview
The initial preview of the NetBox Microsoft DNS integration includes:
- Import of A and AAAA records from Microsoft DNS into NetBox
- Support for both forward and reverse lookup zones
- Automated detection and reconciliation of DNS records against existing NetBox IP addresses
- Flexible mapping of imported DNS data to NetBox objects
- Detailed audit logs for tracking synchronization events
- Identification of conflicts between DNS records and NetBox data
What’s Next? Join the Private Preview
The NetBox Microsoft DNS integration has been developing within the NetBox Labs Experimental stage, with feedback from early users shaping its capabilities. Now, as we enter Private Preview, we’re inviting more users to help us refine the integration and extend its use cases ahead of Customer Preview and General Availability later in 2025.
If you use NetBox alongside Microsoft DNS and want to influence the future of this integration, we’d love for you to join the Private Preview, please fill in the form below. We’ll prioritize applicants based on use cases.
We look forward to working together to create a more unified approach to network service management, with NetBox at the center.
