DNS – Do MX Records Affect Outbound Email?

domain-name-systememailmx-recordsmtp

I'm really confused about the MX Records and generally with email. I've set up Haraka SMTP server for outbound email delivery because I need to send sign up validation emails.

If I don't want to receive emails just to send them, do I need to setup MX records for my email server?

Best Answer

You are not required to have MX records just to send email.

However:

  • you must use a valid, existing and working email domain as sender address in all outgoing traffic (sending mail from something@nonexistentdomain.com is not allowed)
  • any domain used in email traffic can work without MX records if it has a valid A record, but this kind of setup is not much used on the 'net nor really encouraged. If a domain must be able to receive mail, set up valid MX records.
  • any domain used in email traffic (such as the sender address of the previous items) must have a valid and working postmaster@ account, that means the domain must be able to receive mail, that means the domain should have MX records

Short story: you don't have to have/manage MX records, but be sure to use a working email address as sender and be sure it is on a working domain with valid MX records.

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