Are there any free email providers in 2023?
Hey Indie Hackers,
I’m working on a little side project, and I’d like to set up basic email service connected to my domain so that users can communicate with me.
The problem is that I bought my domain through GoDaddy as I have been doing since the beginning of time. They have always included a free basic email service with every domain you buy, but apparently they recently stopped including the email service.
It seems I have to now pay GoDaddy a monthly fee to have a simple help email box :(
I’m a little disappointed, and I know that there has to be a better way.
What do you’all recommend for free or cheap email using my domain name in 2023?
Thank you in advance!
Cheers
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There are actually a few options depending on what you need.
Zoho Mail – They still have a free plan for custom domains (up to 5 users). You just need to update your MX records and you're good to go.
Cloudflare Email Routing – If you only need basic addresses like support@ or hello@, you can create unlimited aliases and forward them to your main inbox for free.
ImprovMX – Similar idea, lets you create multiple aliases and forward emails to Gmail.
The main thing many people miss is that not every role email needs a separate mailbox.
For example:
sales@
support@
info@
These can all be aliases managed from one inbox instead of paying for multiple accounts.
A lot of startups end up paying for several mailboxes when they could manage most of them from a single inbox setup.
There are actually a few options depending on what you need.
Zoho Mail – They still have a free plan for custom domains (up to 5 users). You just need to update your MX records and you're good to go.
Cloudflare Email Routing – If you only need basic addresses like support@ or hello@, you can create unlimited aliases and forward them to your main inbox for free.
ImprovMX – Similar idea, lets you create multiple aliases and forward emails to Gmail.
The main thing many people miss is that not every role email needs a separate mailbox.
For example:
sales@
support@
info@
These can all be aliases managed from one inbox instead of paying for multiple accounts.
A lot of startups end up paying for several mailboxes when they could manage most of them from a single inbox setup.
Zoho has a Forever Free email plan
And some hosting providers bundle free email. Hostinger has a super cheap shared hosting plan (100 domains on 1 plan!) which lets you create several free email addresses per domain with Titan mail.
Thank you for this! I'm going to check Zoho out : )
To use your custom domain like [email protected] it's like $1 a month, still pretty cheap.
If you have iCloud+, you can add a custom domain for free. If you don't, sign up for the $1 per month plan and you can link custom domains to mail.
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212514
I've run into the same issue recently. Namecheap offers private email accounts for less than 1$ a month. I just gave it a try, and so far so good.
I'm using Zoho which is very cheap. I can manage all my domains from it. I think I paid like $10 for one year
Mailgun still has a free plan with 5000 emails/month.
I was thinking more about a simple email back like [email protected] that I can email back and forth to users with. Mailgun doesn't offer that these days do though?
We have been using SendGrid for our email marketing requirements. You don't have to maintain email server to send mails. You can send about 200 mails per day. So if you are not using email provider extensively, you can try free plan of SendGrid. Also, you can try their "Pro" plan if you need more features.
The best email service providers are all the subject of this. Top free suppliers incorporate Gmail, Hurray, Viewpoint, AOL, Zoho, Mail. Com, and ProtonMail.
ProtonMail, CounterMail, Hushmail, and Tutanota are the email providers with the highest level of security out of all of them. Zoho, Gmail, Hushmail, and ProtonMail are a few examples of paid webmail clients.
You can buy a domain and get a free email box with AOL?
We have faced a similar situation with GoDaddy. I have noticed that they offer a very low price in the first year but charge a very high price in the following year. They also charge a huge amount for simple services that other providers offer for free.
When I wanted to add SSL to my site, they asked for a very high price per year. I tried using Cloudflare with GoDaddy hosting, but faced errors, and the GoDaddy team was unable to solve the problem. I then switched my hosting to Namecheap, and everything went smoothly and perfectly.
I would never recommend anyone to use GoDaddy because their service was totally bad. I have seen their reviews, and people are not happy with their services, but they still spending a huge amount for the marketing and other branded things. Thats why new people easily go there.
Yeah, I agree.. Their services have been slowly erroding lately : (
They are one of the last companies left from the Pets.com superbowl ad era, but I don't know how much time they have left at this point.
What kind of projects are you setting up that you need to purchase an SSL?
Personally I use Cloudways for website hosting, and they have a partnership with Rackspace for a full email inbox for $1 a month. Good WP hosting + an email for $12/month!
Google Workspace is $6 USD per month. That's $72 USD per year. It makes it hard for others to compete with this is so low for so much.
Microsoft 365 Business Basic is the same cost, which includes there office suite except Access. Almost every company I've ever worked for used Microsoft Office including the one I work at now. I've never used Google Workspace so I'm not sure what comes with their Bundle.
Yeah, this may explain why so many providers have stopped offering a free email box recently.
This is what I have been doing. I have a free Outlook account and a domain under Namecheap.com (I am not sponsored by them). I will
Firstly, I setup an email forwarding rule at Namecheap.com to my outlook email: https://www.namecheap.com/support/knowledgebase/article.aspx/308/2214/how-to-set-up-free-email-forwarding/
Then, I go to my Outlook.com to include alias: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/add-or-remove-an-email-alias-in-outlook-com-459b1989-356d-40fa-a689-8f285b13f1f2
Outlook.com will ask to verify that the alias is really yours by sending a verification email to your alias email address, which has been forwarded to the Outlook.com anyway. So, you can verify the email and have the alias in your Outlook.com. You can then set the email address of your domain to send out email from Outlook.com and receive email to your domain at Outlook.com.
AAH, didn't know you could setup the 'send out' as the custom domain on free outlook accounts.
You can also do it in gmail.