How Do I Set Up Email Forwarding to Gmail Account?

October 18, 2013 39.4k views
timbaker1979
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timbaker1979
Hi, I've tried many of the answers on the forum here but am not finding anything that works. I registered my domain name through NameCheap.com and it's pointed to my droplet. My blog works fine, but now I'm trying to set it up so info@mydomain.com will auto-forward to my gmail address. Can anyone help or point me in the right direction? Thanks
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11 Answers
eode February 3, 2015

Digital Ocean doesn't provide a service like the one you're looking for -- but there is a way to use NameCheap's services and still have your name point to your droplet.

The consequence of using NameCheap's name servers instead of your own is that things like PTR records will be handled at NameCheap, not here on Digital Ocean. But ths is probably what you want. Also, f your IP address for your droplet changes for any reason, you'll need to go to NameCheap to update it. The same is true for adding subdomains, etc.

  • Go to the DigitalOcean DNS panel, and look up the IP address of your droplet. Keep this up for reference.
  • Go to NameCheap, and select "Transfer DNS Back to Us"
  • Go to NameCheap, and select "All Host Records"
  • Copy records over from the DNS page on Digital Ocean
    • For example, hostname '@' should have the IP address of your server, and it should be an 'a' record.
    • Don't include the Digital Ocean 'ns' entries.

You should now be able to forward mail using NameCheap, and access to your host name should point to the droplet.

EDIT: Any idea how to do second-level indentation?

EDIT 2: Oh, the markdown's not working properly. ..anyways, the last two list items above should be indented.

EDIT 3: Also, note that the service provided by NameCheap is only a forwarding service, you won't be able to set it up in gmail as a proper email address.

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ehudziegelman April 2, 2018

If you used GoDaddy to buy your domain name
Once setting DigitalOcean DNS configuration, and leaving in effect the auto forward to gmail on GoDaddy
you can set the following MX settings on your DigitalOcean Droplet and the forwarding to gmail will go back working:

MX @ mailstore1.secureserver.net (Priority: 10)
MX @ smtp.secureserver.net (Priority: 0)

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  • objectivetc April 12, 2018

    ehudziegelman: Thank you! This was exactly what I was missing.

    I used this to setup "free" domain email addresses at gmail.
    To recap the process: I registered with GoDaddy, they offer 100 free forwarding addresses for each domain. From the ForwardingEmailAddress screen, after you setup the forwarding address, go to tools -> server settings, select your domain from the drop-down list, and GoDaddy will tell you that these two records are missing. Coming back here to DigitalOcean, go to Networking -> select your domain that you've setup, and add the two records mentioned by ehudziegelman / GoDaddy. Now go back to GoDaddy's server settings page, REFRESH IT, and choose your domain again from the dropdown list, and instantly GoDaddy recognizes the MX records properly installed with DO's nameservers. HOWEVER, it took 1 to 2 HOURS for the MX records to propagate to the nameservers, meaning all emails that I sent to the forwarding address went into limbo during this time. After several hours, the emails were properly forwarded (in my case I set it to forward to gmail).

    For anyone else setting up through gmail, google "tjkelly email forwarding" to setup an alias for your return address that matches your forwarding address.

pablo October 18, 2013
You're not talking about Google Apps, right? Assuming you're not, you would do that through NameCheap's control panel.
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pablo October 18, 2013
Or... you can POP your info@mydomain.com emails into your Gmail Inbox and even be able to send mail as info@mydomain.com from your Gmail web interface.
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timbaker1979 October 18, 2013
NameCheap used to give me the option to use their free forwarding, but since I now have my DNS settings running through DigitalOcean, I no longer have that option since it all runs through here. I just want to be able to have any emails sent to info@mydomain.com forward to my gmail address. Right now, anyone that sends an email gets it bounced back since I have no mail servers set up.
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pablo October 18, 2013
You'll have to install a POP server. Check out Dovecot Server | Ubuntu Server Guide and set up an MX record.
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kyle384486 April 30, 2014
This confuses me, because I have a client using GoDaddy and DigitalOcean and the email forwarding from GoDaddy works just fine, with the DNS set to DigitalOcean. Why doesn't this work for NameCheap?
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asb MOD April 30, 2014
Unfortunately, NameCheap doesn't offer email forwarding to its clients that use their nameservers and control panel. There's not much we can do about it on our end.
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keeshux January 12, 2015

I don't know your starting setup, but you'll certainly need a mail server (MTA) with an alias entry in your domain pointing to your Gmail address. If you use postfix have a look at "man virtual" and this tutorial.

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Koppie January 30, 2015
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shacker October 13, 2015

I just tried the NameCheap experiment on one of my domains. Handed control of DNS back to them, set up a forwarder, gave it a while, and sent a test that successfully forwarded to GMail. There's one downside though: GMail displays the incoming message as coming from:

John Doe via registrar-servers.com

That "via" part is not a very professional appearance - kind of weird and off-putting for recipients. I think I'll go for the postfix setup after all.

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