I looked into this some time back and Zoho was the biggest provider I found that allows you to wire up a custom domain email for free. I didn't end up using them though.
Migadu might be an option. It gives you unlimited domains and mailboxes. 19$ a year and they’re in Switzerland.
Pair it with notmuch and offlineimap and you also have a searchable local index (and backup)
I highly recommend having your own domain for email because nobody can take it away from you. Google can decide you’re a miscreant and then good luck with that as there is no human you can talk to. But if you own the domain you can just move it to another email provider.
Protonmail does it quite nicely, but not on the free tiers. Have a duo plan with two domains, one for me and one for my spouse. They do catchall for receiving, but if you want to send with the address you have to configure one of your email addresses.
I have a setup where I use a catch-all rule to receive all mail sent to my domain. This way I can make up e-mail addresses on the fly (like <business>@domain.com), and still have them delivered to my inbox. Very useful if you're at a till and need to give them an email address for some random bs. Another advantage is that you'll know exactly what company or service leaked/sold your personal information.
I am EU based and use Startmail as my email provider, and the K-9 Mail app on my Android to receive/send emails (K-9 can be configured with multiple sender addresses).
If you're somewhat tech savvy it isn't too bad to set up, and Startmail has some very easy to follow guides + customer support that'll assist when requested.
Yup, with your own domain you can have anything@yourdomain.com even without configuring each address. Just make sure the hosting provider you go with does support catch-all. If you actually want to sent from those addresses you are looking for what are called mail aliases. There often is a limit to these, so I only configure them when I actually do need to send something from a specific address and otherwise rely on catch-all.
I have been a happy user of mailbox.org but there are plenty of other providers out there.
I enjoy Mailbox.org. I think they allow something insane like 25-50 custom email addresses. I use it for all of my websites. Being hosted in Germany the website is sometimes slow from the US and Japan, in my experience. That said, once I set everything up I never visit the website.
There was an introductory offer for those moving their services from the US to Europe. You might email them about this. They gave me six months free. I think after that it is 5$ or so a month, maybe less. Highly recommend.
I used Proton mail before this, but it is a walled garden, expensive, and slightly pro-Trump. I then moved to Tuta which is also a walled garden. Neither of these options allow me to use my own email apps.
Oh yeah, and for sending emails, I setuped AWS mail sending feature. You pay by usage. But they do not allow you send emails publicly at first, I sent them an request and explained in detail that I wanted to use for personal email sending and how many emails per month approx I send (i just said 100per month although its much less in reality) and they approved it
I have multiple domains registered through Porkbun, who I've never had an issue with, and they allow 20 free email forwarders per domain. Although, I think price per forwarder after that is a bit high.
Also have Zoho (on the One plan,) which is a company that I do like, although if I remember correctly, they don't allow many forwarders and they were a little harder to set up than on Porkbun. As much as I like them, some of their apps can be a little unwieldy.
I use cloudflare for receiving, configured to forward all emails received at my domain to my Gmail. I use purelymail for sending since it's cheap and their web UI supports specifying a "from" address.
Gmail has announced that starting in January, they will no longer allow free users to send e-mail from custom domains (using the traditional SMTP forwarding method they have always supported). This is an artificial limitation they are imposing with the goal to extort their older users. You will have to purchase a Google Workspace plan, send e-mail only from @gmail.com, or jump ship. So keep that in mind, since moving e-mails can take some time and effort (speaking as someone who just completed my own move away from gmail). Best to start early!
I've investigated several of the main alternatives and ended up going with Fastmail, an australian-owned service (with EU datacenters) that costs €5/month (or less per person if you get a family plan for 4 to 6 people). They support a very large number of custom domains, basically unlimited anonimity-friendly forwarders and provide as much space as paid Google for a lower price (Google currently has a discount going but only until the end of the year, so people are getting double-screwed in January). Their support is friendly and helpful and responds in just a few days. They are employee-owned. They don't have free plans other than a time-limited trial, meaning they aren't set up for selling anyone's data (anymore). They graciously extended my trial when I asked them to (I had to go on vacation).
I've tried Zoho. Zoho is indian-owned and some people swear by it. It has a free tier and more features (I find their UI to be a bit of a complicated mess). However, you need an enterprise plan in order to use custom domains. I asked them about this through the contact form in their own UI, but somehow that required them redirecting me to a different call center after a week and making me wait three weeks for the response in total. To me, they do not inspire trust. What happens if I have a real issue?
Tuta (german) and Proton (swiss) are other possible alternatives I checked, but they have their own drawbacks. Most notably, they have artificially low custom domain name support for no reason, and euro for euro they provide less storage than fastmail (EDIT: In their standard plans. You can buy more expensive plans, which are more expensive than Google). Tuta being in Germany is also a little concerning since I don't fully trust the legal framework there when it comes to respecting privacy and freedom of expression, even though the company itself seems reliable (I know...) Proton is the opposite, it had some controversy associated with its dickhead CEO but seem more reliable with regard to their privacy and security.
With regard to domain name registrars I'm led to believe Porkbun (my registrar) and Cloudflare are currently the reliable options. For others reading this, do not use Namecheap anymore!
I've seen a few people say this but can you expand on why? I have a few domains on name cheap and am using their email service but have been thinking about jumping to porkbun with proton handling my custom domain email addresses
Interesting, I've been using Namecheap for many many years now...and had not known there were issues with them. (Never encountered any issues.) However, over the last year i had been migrating away from them (towards porkbun)...but that had nothing to do with function or behavior, and had everything to do with them raising their prices...whereas porkbun still has quite low pricing. So, my migration away from namecheap for better pricing is now maybe helping shield me from whatever shenanigans they're pulling? Huh, well, look at that! TIL
However, you need an enterprise plan in order to use custom domains.
I do not know where in the world you are based...but I'm based in the U.S., and Zoho offers extremely cheap plans that are not enterprise level, where you can indeed use your own domain name. In fact, I've been a Zoho customer for several years. I've been using the "Mail Lite" plan and started paying $1 per month, and this includes a handful of my own custom domain names....but then about 3 years ago, increased the storage limit, so now pay $1.25 per month per user. Its pretty cheap pricing! Here's the pricing page: https://www.zoho.com/mail/zohomail-pricing.html#zplan2
Now, again, maybe where you are based, they do not offer these cheap plans...but definitely offered (for years now) for folks in the U.s.
Also, as to the functionality/performance of zoho, i would say they're fine. Maybe other providers are faster, but not by much...and i feel you get a really good value for the low monthly cost....of course this might only be my experience.
As to the UI of their web apps....yeah, i'm not a fan. I think they're designed well enough, its just that they fill their apps with soooo many knobs and buttons, etc...that to me its simply that they include everything in their UI/too busy...this is a personal opinion of course...However, if you use other tools to access your email, like thunderbird, etc....then the UI issue is not a problem.
I'm not affiliated with zoho, and could care less if anyone signs up with them or whatever, but for many years now, i can not knock zoho...i've received great performance, low cost, and the like 2 times i needed to reach out to their tech support (which admittedly was low complexity topics) they were addressed within reasonable amount of time via tech support chat. So, i recommend zoho....but that should NOT take away that there are also plenty of other good providers out there as well such as fastmail, etc. Thankfully, there is choice out!
Thank you for sharing your experience. It's unfortunate that they didn't know to explain that to me when I queried them on the subject. They did have a lot of time to respond...
When i woke up today i did not expect to be the pseudo-sales person for Zoho! lol :-D
More seriously, if you scour some forums (like tildes, hacker news, lobsters, reddit, etc.) and search for email providers that you can pay, there will be no shortage...however, you will start to see a pattern of common names begin to emerge...I happen to use Zoho, but there are tons of people who will mention Fastmail, migadu, and other providers who have reasonable costs and great service....so i highly suggest you do your homework to find those names of email providers that keep coming up...and then you can do your own trials of them. I mean, that's how i stumbled upon zoho years ago. And, because i use my own domain name, NOTHING is stopping me from moving to a different provider without losing any messages, etc....And in my case, i have like 2 or 3 backup providers (like fastmail, etc.) that i would jump to in a heart beat if Zoho ever begins to enshittify their service. ;-)
Hi @everyone_is_butiful may i highly recommend you move away from Google/gmail, and towards ANY other email provider that folks here recommend plus using your own domain name. Google and other big tech companies will only tighten their grip more and more...so if you can afford it, get or use a domain name and PAY an email provider to use which allows you to use your domain name. By using your own domain name for ALL of your email, it gives you maximum flexibility...Because if you ever become unhappy with an email provider, you can switch and NEVER have to change your mail address again.
Here is what i suggest as a rough plan:
Get or start using your domain name...ensure it is one that you can expect to use for decades, years down the line.
Research which email provider you would use e.g. fastmail, zoho, namecheap, Gandi (many domain providers sell cheap mail services), etc.
Go with one paid option for email provider where you can use your domain name.
Set things up and start testing it, getting used to using your own domian name.
Little by little for all of your bills, EVERYTHING in your life that has an account with your old gmail mail address, change your email address to your new one with YOUR domain namne...Do NOT feel you need to rush this.,...do it little by little. Even make a list of all the areas that are CORE/IMPORTANT and just update the info little by little, at your own pace.
In parallel, see if Gmail still supports automatically forwarding messages...and still log into both your new email provider and Gmail - to ensure you don;t miss anything.
At some point in the future, the messages will slow to a trickle on gmail side...but do NOT get rid of it....since you can still use gmail as your account to access services like youtube...but maybe by then , your life will live on your paid email providers and you can get whatver services you need (for mail anyway).
Mxroute runs promotional lifetime 5gb total space with unlimited email creation from time to time. I have that set up with my custom domain. I use my custom email boxes primarily for spam/signup/single accounts so space isn't a huge deal to me.
HiddenTig | 18 hours ago
I looked into this some time back and Zoho was the biggest provider I found that allows you to wire up a custom domain email for free. I didn't end up using them though.
bellewinn | 14 hours ago
I use Fastmail, and have rules that separate out my personal and work emails into different folders based on prefix. Works a treat!
preposterous | 14 hours ago
Migadu might be an option. It gives you unlimited domains and mailboxes. 19$ a year and they’re in Switzerland.
Pair it with notmuch and offlineimap and you also have a searchable local index (and backup)
I highly recommend having your own domain for email because nobody can take it away from you. Google can decide you’re a miscreant and then good luck with that as there is no human you can talk to. But if you own the domain you can just move it to another email provider.
lonbar | 8 hours ago
Just adding on that, while Migadu is based in Switzerland, their servers are based in France.
vord | 10 hours ago
Protonmail does it quite nicely, but not on the free tiers. Have a duo plan with two domains, one for me and one for my spouse. They do catchall for receiving, but if you want to send with the address you have to configure one of your email addresses.
vuzzar | 17 hours ago
I have a setup where I use a catch-all rule to receive all mail sent to my domain. This way I can make up e-mail addresses on the fly (like <business>@domain.com), and still have them delivered to my inbox. Very useful if you're at a till and need to give them an email address for some random bs. Another advantage is that you'll know exactly what company or service leaked/sold your personal information.
I am EU based and use Startmail as my email provider, and the K-9 Mail app on my Android to receive/send emails (K-9 can be configured with multiple sender addresses).
If you're somewhat tech savvy it isn't too bad to set up, and Startmail has some very easy to follow guides + customer support that'll assist when requested.
creesch | 15 hours ago
Yup, with your own domain you can have anything@yourdomain.com even without configuring each address. Just make sure the hosting provider you go with does support catch-all. If you actually want to sent from those addresses you are looking for what are called mail aliases. There often is a limit to these, so I only configure them when I actually do need to send something from a specific address and otherwise rely on catch-all.
I have been a happy user of mailbox.org but there are plenty of other providers out there.
ocean-hai | 17 hours ago
I enjoy Mailbox.org. I think they allow something insane like 25-50 custom email addresses. I use it for all of my websites. Being hosted in Germany the website is sometimes slow from the US and Japan, in my experience. That said, once I set everything up I never visit the website.
There was an introductory offer for those moving their services from the US to Europe. You might email them about this. They gave me six months free. I think after that it is 5$ or so a month, maybe less. Highly recommend.
I used Proton mail before this, but it is a walled garden, expensive, and slightly pro-Trump. I then moved to Tuta which is also a walled garden. Neither of these options allow me to use my own email apps.
freedomischaos | 9 hours ago
I use purelymail. It's cheap. You can have SMTP and IMAP or just forward to another email. Has catch-all too.
matejc | 8 hours ago
I used to use Email Routing feature of Cloudflare for forwarding some random named email with my own domain to my personal email. https://developers.cloudflare.com/email-service/get-started/route-emails/
It can catch all as well. And its free*
Nitpicks:
matejc | 7 hours ago
Oh yeah, and for sending emails, I setuped AWS mail sending feature. You pay by usage. But they do not allow you send emails publicly at first, I sent them an request and explained in detail that I wanted to use for personal email sending and how many emails per month approx I send (i just said 100per month although its much less in reality) and they approved it
firedoll | 17 hours ago
I have multiple domains registered through Porkbun, who I've never had an issue with, and they allow 20 free email forwarders per domain. Although, I think price per forwarder after that is a bit high.
Also have Zoho (on the One plan,) which is a company that I do like, although if I remember correctly, they don't allow many forwarders and they were a little harder to set up than on Porkbun. As much as I like them, some of their apps can be a little unwieldy.
tibpoe | 8 hours ago
I use cloudflare for receiving, configured to forward all emails received at my domain to my Gmail. I use purelymail for sending since it's cheap and their web UI supports specifying a "from" address.
Protected | 7 hours ago
Gmail has announced that starting in January, they will no longer allow free users to send e-mail from custom domains (using the traditional SMTP forwarding method they have always supported). This is an artificial limitation they are imposing with the goal to extort their older users. You will have to purchase a Google Workspace plan, send e-mail only from
@gmail.com, or jump ship. So keep that in mind, since moving e-mails can take some time and effort (speaking as someone who just completed my own move away from gmail). Best to start early!I've investigated several of the main alternatives and ended up going with Fastmail, an australian-owned service (with EU datacenters) that costs €5/month (or less per person if you get a family plan for 4 to 6 people). They support a very large number of custom domains, basically unlimited anonimity-friendly forwarders and provide as much space as paid Google for a lower price (Google currently has a discount going but only until the end of the year, so people are getting double-screwed in January). Their support is friendly and helpful and responds in just a few days. They are employee-owned. They don't have free plans other than a time-limited trial, meaning they aren't set up for selling anyone's data (anymore). They graciously extended my trial when I asked them to (I had to go on vacation).
I've tried Zoho. Zoho is indian-owned and some people swear by it. It has a free tier and more features (I find their UI to be a bit of a complicated mess). However, you need an enterprise plan in order to use custom domains. I asked them about this through the contact form in their own UI, but somehow that required them redirecting me to a different call center after a week and making me wait three weeks for the response in total. To me, they do not inspire trust. What happens if I have a real issue?
Tuta (german) and Proton (swiss) are other possible alternatives I checked, but they have their own drawbacks. Most notably, they have artificially low custom domain name support for no reason, and euro for euro they provide less storage than fastmail (EDIT: In their standard plans. You can buy more expensive plans, which are more expensive than Google). Tuta being in Germany is also a little concerning since I don't fully trust the legal framework there when it comes to respecting privacy and freedom of expression, even though the company itself seems reliable (I know...) Proton is the opposite, it had some controversy associated with its dickhead CEO but seem more reliable with regard to their privacy and security.
Protected | 7 hours ago
With regard to domain name registrars I'm led to believe Porkbun (my registrar) and Cloudflare are currently the reliable options. For others reading this, do not use Namecheap anymore!
widedub | 5 hours ago
I've seen a few people say this but can you expand on why? I have a few domains on name cheap and am using their email service but have been thinking about jumping to porkbun with proton handling my custom domain email addresses
Protected | 4 hours ago
Horror stories since they sold out to private equity. There was a big one just yesterday!
mxuribe | 2 hours ago
Interesting, I've been using Namecheap for many many years now...and had not known there were issues with them. (Never encountered any issues.) However, over the last year i had been migrating away from them (towards porkbun)...but that had nothing to do with function or behavior, and had everything to do with them raising their prices...whereas porkbun still has quite low pricing. So, my migration away from namecheap for better pricing is now maybe helping shield me from whatever shenanigans they're pulling? Huh, well, look at that! TIL
mxuribe | 5 hours ago
I do not know where in the world you are based...but I'm based in the U.S., and Zoho offers extremely cheap plans that are not enterprise level, where you can indeed use your own domain name. In fact, I've been a Zoho customer for several years. I've been using the "Mail Lite" plan and started paying $1 per month, and this includes a handful of my own custom domain names....but then about 3 years ago, increased the storage limit, so now pay $1.25 per month per user. Its pretty cheap pricing! Here's the pricing page: https://www.zoho.com/mail/zohomail-pricing.html#zplan2
Now, again, maybe where you are based, they do not offer these cheap plans...but definitely offered (for years now) for folks in the U.s.
Also, as to the functionality/performance of zoho, i would say they're fine. Maybe other providers are faster, but not by much...and i feel you get a really good value for the low monthly cost....of course this might only be my experience.
As to the UI of their web apps....yeah, i'm not a fan. I think they're designed well enough, its just that they fill their apps with soooo many knobs and buttons, etc...that to me its simply that they include everything in their UI/too busy...this is a personal opinion of course...However, if you use other tools to access your email, like thunderbird, etc....then the UI issue is not a problem.
I'm not affiliated with zoho, and could care less if anyone signs up with them or whatever, but for many years now, i can not knock zoho...i've received great performance, low cost, and the like 2 times i needed to reach out to their tech support (which admittedly was low complexity topics) they were addressed within reasonable amount of time via tech support chat. So, i recommend zoho....but that should NOT take away that there are also plenty of other good providers out there as well such as fastmail, etc. Thankfully, there is choice out!
Protected | 4 hours ago
Thank you for sharing your experience. It's unfortunate that they didn't know to explain that to me when I queried them on the subject. They did have a lot of time to respond...
mxuribe | 2 hours ago
When i woke up today i did not expect to be the pseudo-sales person for Zoho! lol :-D
More seriously, if you scour some forums (like tildes, hacker news, lobsters, reddit, etc.) and search for email providers that you can pay, there will be no shortage...however, you will start to see a pattern of common names begin to emerge...I happen to use Zoho, but there are tons of people who will mention Fastmail, migadu, and other providers who have reasonable costs and great service....so i highly suggest you do your homework to find those names of email providers that keep coming up...and then you can do your own trials of them. I mean, that's how i stumbled upon zoho years ago. And, because i use my own domain name, NOTHING is stopping me from moving to a different provider without losing any messages, etc....And in my case, i have like 2 or 3 backup providers (like fastmail, etc.) that i would jump to in a heart beat if Zoho ever begins to enshittify their service. ;-)
mxuribe | 5 hours ago
Hi @everyone_is_butiful may i highly recommend you move away from Google/gmail, and towards ANY other email provider that folks here recommend plus using your own domain name. Google and other big tech companies will only tighten their grip more and more...so if you can afford it, get or use a domain name and PAY an email provider to use which allows you to use your domain name. By using your own domain name for ALL of your email, it gives you maximum flexibility...Because if you ever become unhappy with an email provider, you can switch and NEVER have to change your mail address again.
Here is what i suggest as a rough plan:
Thanks and goo luck!
Gaywallet | 3 hours ago
Mxroute runs promotional lifetime 5gb total space with unlimited email creation from time to time. I have that set up with my custom domain. I use my custom email boxes primarily for spam/signup/single accounts so space isn't a huge deal to me.
tomf | 2 hours ago
i like a catch all with zoho. dirt cheap (free if you don’t want imap), too.
one address for everything is the way to do it. every site gets its own address. if they sell it, block it and change it on their site.