7 Free or Cheap Email Hosting Services for Your Custom Domain

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Zoho email clientNo matter where you're hosting your website, custom domain email is one of the vital assets to ensure your target audience can easily connect with you. If your web hosting plan doesn't include email hosting, using a free email address on your contact page can leave a bad impression on you and your business. Fortunately, there are several good email hosting solutions which can be used to get a custom domain email address. I've handpicked some of the free and popular services which can be used to power email communication using your custom domain name. The entire setup of configuring custom emails through these services just requires an addition of few host records. Thereafter, you can either manage your emails through a web interface or through one of the popular email applications. So, let's get started and check out some of the useful free email hosting services to enable the use of custom domain email addresses for our business website. Do check all of them to find the one which fits your business needs.

Postale custom domain email hosting dashboard

1. postale.io: A more recent player, postale.io focuses solely on domain emails, and prides itself in making things super easy and low cost.

From registration to sending/receiving your first email takes less than a minute, and managing domain addresses is extremely simple. While not free per say, the service offers a 30 days free trial without credit card required, and pricing is one of the lowest, starting at 1$ per month.

  • Free trial and low prices - The free trial lasts 30 days, and plans are some of the lowest out there, starting at only $1/month for 2 mailboxes + 3 aliases. Not free, but close!
  • 2 to 1000+ mailboxes - Depending on your budget you can create from 2 mailboxes to thousands. The $5/month Premium plan allowing up to 25 mailboxes covers the need for most small organizations.
  • Unlimited aliases - From Premium onwards you can create an unlimited number of receiving aliases.
  • Unlimited domains - From Premium onwards you can add an unlimited number of domains.
  • 1GB to 20GB per mailbox - The 1GB storage per mailbox from the Base plan is plenty for most people, but higher plans allow up to 20GB.
  • Strong support - The service holds a high rating on Trustpilot from hundreds of reviews, often outlining the quality of the support, and ease of use.
  • Intuitive admin panel - Using the admin panel is a breeze, creating an address takes a few seconds top. A demo account is also available to have a look without registering.
  • Modern webmail - A webmail is included, powered by recent versions of the open-source Roundcube.
  • Easiest setup - The setup is by far the quickest and easiest, with only a two fields form to fill, and clear DNS guidance.
Neo business email service

2. Neo is a business email hosting service designed specifically for small businesses, start-ups, and entrepreneurs. It offers a professional email address to users who lack their own domain, utilizing a complimentary Neo domain. Additionally, Neo provides a complimentary one-page website to help establish and enhance their brand identity, ultimately boosting credibility.

  • Custom ".co.site" Email Address: Get your unique Neo-provided email address.
  • Complimentary Single-page Website: Aligns with your domain, complete with contact forms and social integrations.
  • Read Receipts: Receive instant notifications when recipients open your emails.
  • Email Templates: Save and reuse frequently sent emails as templates.
  • Priority Inbox: Keep important emails in a separate, easily accessible tab.
  • Follow-up Reminders: Automated nudges to follow up on unresponsive emails.
  • Send Later Feature: Compose now, send later – schedule emails for optimal delivery times.
Titan custom email service app

3. Titan: Titan’s business email suite is designed for small businesses to build strong customer relationships. Titan provides customers with a business email account at their domain, a shareable calendar, and ample storage. Features like Schedule Send, Read Receipts, Follow-up Reminders, Priority Inbox, and Signature Builder are provided to help Titan users streamline productivity and focus on the things that matter.

  • 50 GB storage space - Ample space is offered with every mailbox, you can have many emails without the need to delete them to free up space for the newer ones.
  • Email Templates - You can reuse commonly sent emails. This helps you save time while sending repeated emails such as follow-ups or reminders.
  • Read Receipts - Notifies you when your email has been opened—perfect for knowing when to follow up.
  • Follow-up Reminders - Can be set to nudge you to follow up with your customer in case of no reply.
Zoho email client 4. Zoho Mail: This is one of the most popular and widely used email services you can easily use with website's custom domain. The free plan is good enough for most users and is completely free of any pesky ads. I've used it for several clients and their feedback is very positive. The setup process is also quite easy for a layman. Following are some of the impressive features of this email hosting service.

  • Up to 25 email addresses - The free plan enables you to configure more than 2 dozen custom domain email addresses which is more than enough for an average user.
  • Up to 5GB space per inbox - With decent storage space for every email address, you can save thousands of emails without any need to delete them to free up space for the newer ones.
  • Mobile, desktop & web client - Users can use the web interface to quickly access their emails even on public shared computers. Similarly, mobile applications enables you to communicate easily through your smartphone.
  • Powerful dashboard - The administration dashboard includes loads of options to configure policies, rules and filters to easily manage both users and the influx of email traffic.

Migadu email hosting service 5. Migadu: This no-nonsense and powerful email hosting service provides a flexible free plan which can be used to power your custom domain email communication. If you're running your website on a Digital Ocean server, this service enables you to easily configure the email domain records with a single click. Following features are part of this simple and user-friendly email hosting service for a custom domain.
  • Unlimited mailboxes - There's no limit on the number of addresses you can create for your domain which is more than enough for a free plan.
  • 1GB inbox space - With that much storage you can easily save thousands of text and rich HTML emails.
  • Simple web interface - It's web interface is lightning fast though you can configure your favorite email client too right on the desktop.
  • Easy setup - The entire setup is dead simple and involve few steps of setting up host records for the email.
Yandex custom domain email hosting 6. Yandex: This is yet another popular email hosting service available for custom domains. It has a minimal interface and works like charm without any hassle. If you're looking for a reliable email hosting service for your site's domain name, then this hosting service is one of the best candidates for the same. Following features are included in your custom domain email account when using this service.

  • 1000 mailboxes - Now that's a big number when it comes to creating multiple email addresses using a custom domain.
  • Unlimited inbox space - If you're playing fairly and not abusing the privilege, you can easily rest assured of the unlimited inbox space.
  • Themed web interface - The elegant web interface can be customized using different themes that matches with your own preferences.
  • IMAP/POP3 support - This enables you to easily configure almost any email client to access your custom domain emails in an external application.

7. Using Gmail for a Custom Domain

And, last but not the least, we can use Google's Gmail service to power our custom domain email communication. It offers a unique feature through which we can add multiple custom domain addresses right within our Gmail account.

While composing an email, we can easily select the required custom email addresses from the drop-down menu. I've used it in my earlier days of blogging before switching to Google Apps.

It's a simple process which can be completed in less than 5 minutes. Here's how to do it.

Step 1: Go to ImprovMX email forwarding service.

Step 2: Copy the following MX records and add them to the DNS host records of your domain name.

MX DNS records Step 3: Add the domain name and the Gmail address where you want the addresses to be used. Thereafter, click the verification button. A sample set-up is shown below.

Email forwarding setup Step 4: Now, open your Gmail inbox and go to 'Settings → Accounts and Import → Send mail as:' option. Here you can configure as many custom domain email addresses as you want. A sample working setup is shown below.

Custom domain Gmail setup The ImprovMX service catches all the email addresses sent to your domain name and forwards them to your Gmail account. Step 4 ensures you can easily send emails to your target audience using your configured custom domain addresses.