Hello everyone, nice to meet you all.

This question was probably asked around here but is it really possible to be your own mail provider?

I think I’m experienced enough when it comes to homelabbing that I could take on something like this.

I THINK im aware of the technicalities, I did some research but it still begs the question, is it really worth it? would it be hard to build up a reputation so that your emails don’t land in spam folders?

  • flatbield@beehaw.orgEnglish
    3·
    8 hours ago

    Just to emphasize it is the reputation problem and getting common mail providers the accept. You’ll need to get a well known domain like a .net or .com domain. You probably need to have a web site too on the domain. Then let that stuff age. You’ll also need to get a static IP for the VPS your using that has a good reputation and your hosting provider will have to allow you to send email which means you’ll have to talk with them to make sure everything it setup. You’ll also probably want certs both for the website, and for your SMTP server. Then there are SPF, DKIM, DMARK, and DNS configuration you’ll have to make too. Optional other configs like MTA-STS, or DANE. Just a lot of detail. Once your setup, there are testing sites you can go to test or SMTP server.

    Another issue is you want email to be full time. So I think that probably means 2 incoming mail servers on two different VPS systems maybe in two different data centers. Then you need IMAP, and maybe a webmail system. I guess these last two could be one one of the VPS systems hosting one of the SMTP servers. Lot of components.

    I don’t actually using my own VPS based mail system for my main email addresses. Instead we use a shared hosting plan and our own domain instead. You might want to look at is Namecheap CPanel Email that Comes with their Stellar Hosting plan. That is what we use. You can use up to 30 addresses on their base plan and maybe unlimited on the next level up. It is less then $100 per year after you add all you need, the hosting plan, a domain, and certs (maybe more in the $60 range?). The advantage of this, the hosting provider takes care of the infrastructure, and it is cheaper and lest time consuming then two VPS systems and all the work to maintain them.

    About getting other providers to accept your mail, I’ve found Yahoo and the domains they serve to be one of the worst offenders.