What Is a Custom Email Domain?
An email domain is the part of the email address after the @ sign. A custom domain email is anything other than gmail.com, outlook.com, yahoo.com, etc. For example, if I had “david@thisisanicloudtest.com” as my email address, then “thisisanicloudtest.com” would be the custom email domain. Many businesses use custom domain email addresses to promote the business, as it looks more professional. To proceed a bit further, a custom email domain is a domain through which you can send and receive emails. It requires you to either have an email host for that domain (usually offered by the web hosting service for free) or use MX records pointing to Gmail and access them there for a monthly fee. This is where iCloud+ comes in: you can now use iCloud+ as an email host for custom domain email address.
Where to Buy a Custom Domain
In the world of domain buying, GoDaddy is as synonymous with the space as Google is to search. That’s not to say GoDaddy is the only or best option, as alternatives like HostGator, Name.com, NameCheap, Domain.com, Hover and Bluehost round out a list of well-known options. The cost of a domain varies, but generally speaking, a .com domain, the most popular extension, is around $10 to $15. The cost can go up or down if you look at different extensions like .co, .site., .net, .blog, .shop, etc. Once you have secured your domain name, setting up a custom domain email is relatively straightforward. For example, the websites above will help you individually set up a Google Suite custom domain email solution for around $5 to $6 a month to start. On the other hand, an iCloud+ custom domain email starts at $0.99 monthly. That’s a pretty big savings over time!
Setting Up an iCloud+ Custom Email Domain
Once you have your domain purchased, you are well on your way to sending and receiving email with that domain name. A couple of quick caveats to point out before you get started:
To make use of the custom email domain, you must have an iCloud+ subscription or Apple One bundle. That means you are subscribing to any of the iCloud subscription plans:iCloud+ with 50GB of storage ($0.99/month)iCloud+ with 200GB of storage ($2.99/month)iCloud+ with 2TB of storage ($9.99/month)Your custom email address can be used with up to five personal domains with up to three personal addresses per domain.If iCloud+ is shared as part of a Family Sharing group, your email domains can also be shared with family members. Anyone in the Family Group can also set up their own custom domain and manage that address individually.
Two-factor authentication must be enabled for your Apple ID in order to use any custom email domain.A primary iCloud Mail email address must be set up prior to any custom email domain setup. Ideally, this will already have been set up at the time you first used a Mac, iPhone or iPad.
With those caveats out of the way, it’s time to get started setting up your custom email domain. Note that the steps covered here work in any browser, including Safari, Brave, mobile Safari, etc. As there is no desktop Mac or Windows solution, you can only set up your iCloud custom email domain via a web browser. That’s true on both desktop and mobile.
What Settings Need to Be Changed?
Once you have the domain purchased from your domain registrar, such as NameCheap or similar, changing the settings is pretty straightforward. Go back to whichever site you purchased your domain name and locate the section where you can adjust the MX records. These steps follow the same guidelines you followed above on iCloud.com
One MX record that specifies where “thisisanicloudtest.com” email will be delivered. Multiple MX records can be set up with their own priority level.Two TXT records hold all of the right information to avoid/prevent email spoofing.A CNAME record helps point traffic from one domain to another and helps reduce spam. Without this being entered into the DNS record, all outgoing email could be flagged as spam. Make sure you capture the “.” at the end of any MX records.The “Hostname” for both the MX and TXT records are your domain name.Most domain registrars can change the settings within 48 hours before your custom email address with iCloud+ is active.
It’s very important that you properly enter all of these settings within the DNS records of your domain registrar where you purchased the domain. Any mistakes will likely mean lost emails and/or allow emails to be improperly flagged by spam filters. Apple has a detailed document available here to ensure that mistakes are kept to a minimum. Be sure to check the email from Apple to triple verify these entries. MX Records TXT Records CNAME Record
Using Your New iCloud Custom Email Address
Under the assumption you are already logged in to any Mac, iPhone or iPad device, you should start to receive notifications that your new custom email is ready to use. That’s applicable for Mail, iMessage, FaceTime, etc. If you are not already logged in to iCloud, you should do so now, triggering your custom iCloud email to automatically appear. To verify that it’s working, open up the default Mail app on your iPhone, iPad or Mac to see if the custom mail is available to use in the “From” drop-down box. If it is, you can start using it immediately. To verify everything is working on a Windows computer:
