diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index ebde04cb..90a97e3a 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -4,6 +4,10 @@ FEATURE: New metrics infrastructure based on OpenZiti usage events (https://gith
 
 CHANGE: The underlying database store now utilizes a `deleted` flag on all tables to implement "soft deletes". This was necessary for the new metrics infrastructure, where we need to account for metrics data that arrived after the lifetime of a share or environment; and also we're going to need this for limits, where we need to see historical information about activity in the past (https://github.com/openziti/zrok/issues/262)
 
+# v0.3.5
+
+CHANGE: `zrok config set apiEndpoint` now validates that the new API endpoint correctly starts with `http://` or `https://` (https://github.com/openziti/zrok/issues/258)
+
 # v0.3.4
 
 CHANGE: `zrok test endpoint` incorporates `--ziti` mode (and related flags) to allow direct endpoint listening on a Ziti service
diff --git a/cmd/zrok/configSet.go b/cmd/zrok/configSet.go
index 8b9837e9..a72d29f4 100644
--- a/cmd/zrok/configSet.go
+++ b/cmd/zrok/configSet.go
@@ -2,10 +2,12 @@ package main
 
 import (
 	"fmt"
+	"net/url"
+	"os"
+
 	"github.com/openziti/zrok/tui"
 	"github.com/openziti/zrok/zrokdir"
 	"github.com/spf13/cobra"
-	"os"
 )
 
 func init() {
@@ -42,6 +44,13 @@ func (cmd *configSetCommand) run(_ *cobra.Command, args []string) {
 		if zrd.Cfg == nil {
 			zrd.Cfg = &zrokdir.Config{}
 		}
+		ok, err := isFullyValidUrl(value)
+		if err != nil {
+			tui.Error("unable to validate api endpoint", err)
+		}
+		if !ok {
+			tui.Error("invalid apiEndpoint; please make sure URL starts with http:// or https://", nil)
+		}
 		zrd.Cfg.ApiEndpoint = value
 		modified = true
 
@@ -62,3 +71,14 @@ func (cmd *configSetCommand) run(_ *cobra.Command, args []string) {
 		fmt.Println("zrok configuration not changed")
 	}
 }
+
+func isFullyValidUrl(rawUrl string) (bool, error) {
+	u, err := url.Parse(rawUrl)
+	if err != nil {
+		return false, err
+	}
+	if u.Scheme == "" || u.Host == "" {
+		return false, nil
+	}
+	return true, nil
+}