How to set up email on your domain

An email address at your own domain — you@yourdomain.com rather than a free address at a big-name provider — is created in your hosting control panel, not with your mail app. The mail app is just the window you read it through afterwards. Get the mailbox created and configured correctly first, and connecting any device to it becomes a five-minute job.

Before you create anything

A mailbox on a domain that is not yet pointing at your hosting will not receive anything, no matter how correctly it is configured. Email is routed by a domain's MX records, which are separate from the records that point your website. If you have just signed up for hosting and added the domain to your account, that part is usually already handled — but if the domain currently lives somewhere else, sort out its MX records or, more simply, point the domain at your hosting before going any further.

Creating the mailbox

1. Sign in to your control panel

   Use the login details from your hosting welcome email.

2. Open the email section

   Every control panel groups mailbox management in one place. Look for a section named something like "Email" or "Mailboxes".

3. Add a new mailbox

   Choose the domain if your account holds more than one, type the part before the @ sign, and set a password. Use a password you have not reused anywhere else — a mailbox is one of the more valuable accounts to compromise, since it can usually reset the passwords on everything else you own.

4. Save and note the settings

   Once the mailbox exists, your control panel displays the incoming and outgoing server names and ports for it. You will need these for the next step, so keep them open in a tab.

The settings you will use everywhere

Every mail app asks for the same handful of settings, whatever it is called and whichever device it runs on. Your control panel is the only place that shows the correct server hostnames for your account — never copy one from a guide, including this one, because they differ between hosting platforms.

Connecting a mail app

With the mailbox created and its settings noted, add it to whichever app you actually use. The steps differ slightly by app, so use the guide for the one you have:

• Setting up email in Outlook
• Sending and receiving domain email in Gmail
• Setting up email on an iPhone
• Setting up email on Android
• Setting up email in Apple Mail

If you would rather not install anything, webmail gives you the same mailbox through a browser with nothing to configure beyond your address and password. See how to use webmail.

Getting authentication right from the start

A mailbox works the moment it is created, but the domain sending it out benefits from three DNS records that tell other mail servers the mail is genuinely yours: SPF, DKIM and DMARC. They are not required to send your first message, but skipping them for long increases the chance your mail lands in spam once volume picks up. SPF, DKIM and DMARC explained covers what each one does and the order to set them up in.

If the mailbox does not seem to work yet

• Check the domain has finished pointing at your hosting. A mailbox created before that finishes will not receive external mail yet.
• Double-check the server names. A mistyped server hostname is the single most common setup mistake, and it produces a connection error rather than an obviously wrong message.
• Confirm the port matches the security setting. Port 993 needs SSL/TLS enabled in the app; entering it with security switched off will not connect.
• Send yourself a test message from a different account entirely, so you are testing delivery rather than just the connection.

If mail still is not arriving after that, troubleshooting email you are not receiving goes through the rest of the checks in order, and our support team can look at your account directly if none of them find it.