Use your own domain with Scroogle Mail

Your address doesn't have to end in @scrooglemail.com. Bring your own domain and become you@yourname.co.uk - with all the same encryption, zero-access storage and tracker blocking underneath. Custom domains are included on every plan: 1 domain on Essential, 3 on Plus, and 3 per person on Family.

You keep your domain exactly where it is. We're not a registrar and we don't want to be - your domain stays with whoever you bought it from, and we just need a handful of DNS records added there. Typical setup takes about ten minutes of actual work; the rest is waiting for DNS changes to propagate, which is usually under an hour but can take up to 48 hours.

Everything below happens in two places: your registrar's DNS control panel (where you add records) and Settings > Domains in Scroogle Mail (where you add the domain and check its status). If your DNS is hosted somewhere other than your registrar - Cloudflare, for instance - make the changes wherever your nameservers actually point.

1Step 1
Verify you own the domain

First we need proof the domain is yours, so nobody else can claim it. In Settings > Domains, click Add a domain, type your domain name, and we'll show you a unique verification code. Add it at your registrar as a TXT record:

The value above is an example - use the code shown in your own Settings > Domains page. @ means the bare domain itself; some control panels want you to leave the Host field blank instead, or to type the full domain name.

Once the record is in, go back to Settings > Domains and click Verify. If it doesn't pass first time, that's almost always propagation - give it an hour and try again. The verification record is only checked during setup, but it's harmless to leave in place afterwards.

2Step 2
Receive mail on your domain

MX records tell the rest of the internet where mail for your domain should be delivered. Add both of these - the second is a backup route, and mail servers pick the lowest priority number first:

Once the MX records have propagated, mail sent to any address you've created on the domain lands in your Scroogle Mail inbox - encrypted to your key the moment it arrives, same as everything else.

3Step 3
Prove your mail is yours (SPF, DKIM, DMARC)

Three more records stop other people impersonating your domain, and stop your own messages landing in spam folders. In plain English:

• SPF publishes a list of servers allowed to send mail as your domain - ours, in this case.
• DKIM puts a cryptographic signature on every message you send, so receiving servers can check it wasn't tampered with and really came from your domain.
• DMARC tells receiving servers what to do with mail that fails those checks - and where to send the reports.

Add the following records:

Why three DKIM records?

Signing keys shouldn't live forever. We rotate DKIM keys regularly as a matter of hygiene, and because your records are CNAMEs pointing at us rather than the keys themselves, we can retire an old key and bring a new one into service without you touching your DNS ever again. Three records means there's always a current key, a next key, and headroom for rotation - set them once and forget them.

When all the records check out, the domain's status in Settings > Domains flips to Active, with a green tick against each record. You can then create addresses and aliases on the domain, and pick any of them as your From address when composing.

Catch-all addresses

A catch-all accepts mail sent to any address at your domain that doesn't already exist - typo@yourname.co.uk, madeupname@yourname.co.uk, all of it - and delivers it to a mailbox you choose. Without one, mail to a non-existent address simply bounces back to the sender.

The trade-off is spam. Spammers guess addresses by the dictionary, and a catch-all obligingly accepts every guess. On a domain that's been around a while, expect a noticeable bump in junk. Our filters catch most of it, but if you only need a handful of addresses, explicit aliases are the tidier tool - and they tell you exactly who leaked which address.

Catch-all is included on Plus and Family plans; Essential covers explicit addresses and aliases only. To enable it per domain:

1. Go to Settings > Domains > your domain > Catch-all.
2. Switch it on and pick the address that should receive the strays.
3. Save. It takes effect immediately - no DNS changes needed.

How catch-all interacts with aliases

Exact matches always win. If shopping@yourname.co.uk exists as an address or alias, mail to it goes where that alias says - the catch-all only receives mail for addresses that don't exist. And if you delete an alias, the catch-all quietly starts collecting its mail instead of bouncing it, which is handy if you binned an alias slightly too enthusiastically. One thing a catch-all deliberately doesn't do: resurrect mail for an alias you've blocked. Blocked means blocked.

Troubleshooting