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Subdomains vs. Domains

What each one actually is

Your domain is the name you bought, such as example.com. A subdomain is a label added in front of it, and you can usually create as many as you like at no extra cost.

There is a third option that people mix into this argument. A subfolder, such as example.com/shop, lives inside the site you already have.

All three can hold a full website with as many pages as you want. The difference is how separate the new thing feels, both to people and to search engines.

So the question is never really technical. It is about how closely you want the new pages tied to the old ones.

How search engines tend to treat them

Search engines crawl all three of these the same way. What differs is how closely the new pages get associated with the parent site.

A subfolder is plainly part of the main site. A subdomain often reads as a related but separate property. A different domain reads as a different site, with nothing carried across from the old one.

None of this is a switch you can flip for an advantage. Treat it as a signal you are sending about how connected these pages genuinely are.

A simple way to choose

Ask who the new pages are for, and whether they belong in the same story as your main site. The answer usually points at one of these.

• Same brand, same topic, same team — use a subfolder
• Same brand but a different job, like a help center or a store — a subdomain fits
• A different brand, or a name you may want to sell one day — use its own domain
• A short campaign that will end — a subdomain is cheap to make and easy to retire
• A name you already own and want to put to work — build on the domain itself

How Microsite Generator handles this

You get both routes here, and you are allowed to change your mind. Publish on a free subdomain the same day, or connect your own domain with a single CNAME record.

When you use your own name, the SSL certificate is issued for you, so the padlock is there without a support ticket. There are step-by-step walkthroughs for the common registrars.

Wherever the site lives, it clears the compliance gate before publishing and is checked against Google Search Essentials and modern web standards. Each page is individually built for the subject, so the pages stay genuinely useful rather than repetitive.

Updated September 2026