Custom domain url in IIS Express with Visual Studio 2013

If your creating a web application in Visual Studio 2013 (VS2013) and run it, your site is hosted in IIS express. Your url is localhost with a random portnumber.

If you want integration with Facebook, other services or just want a custom domain in your browser then you can follow these steps.

  1. Go to the properties of your (MVC) web application
  2. Go to the web tab on the left
  3. Under Servers check the Override application root URL and fill in http://YourSubDomain.YourDomain.com
  4. Hit Create Virutal Directory
  5. Change the start url above under Start Action to http://YourSubDomain.YourDomain.com
  6. Go to your IIS Express settings under C:\Users\Ralph\Documents\IISExpress\config and open the applicationhost.config file.
  7. Find your site and adjust the binding<bindings>
    <binding protocol=”http” bindingInformation=”*:80:YourSubDomain.YourDomain.com” />
    </bindings>
  8. Optionally add the binding for https (443)
  9. Go to your host file under C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc and add 127.0.0.1 YourSubDomain.YourDomain.com
  10. Run your site

If you get an error. Try to run your Visual Studio instance as Administrator.

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