email selfhosting: relayhost of selfhosting for outbound reddit / selfhosted ---------------------------------------------------------------------- hyeroo 路 2023-12-15 07:37 Hi, I am managing my own email server (postfix). It's just a family server for a couple of people. Until recently, I was using the smtp relay provided by my registrar (gandi) for outbound emails. It was free, but they started asking 5$ per email address per month 馃く馃挷 So I have setup DKIM and SPF (diddn't do DMARC because I'm not sure it makes a difference), made sure I was not on any blacklist, that my ptr record was correct. Despite all this, I run a spam test on [glockapps.com](https://glockapps.com). It working by giving me a dozen emails to various providers, asking me to send them an email, and giving me the results. About half of them are classified as spams. And that does not count a few ones that are not even received (everything in [att.net](https://att.net) for example). Is there a simple way to improve that situation? If not, I would need to find a new relay host. What are good ones adapted to a small family email server? Thanks a lot. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand 路 2023-12-15 08:29 Unless you have something configured, sadly there isn't an easy way to fix this. Setup DMARC. Run a test against your domain and fix everything: https://mxtoolbox.com/diagnostic.aspx Pray. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- TBT_TBT 路 2023-12-15 10:06 Are you hosting on a server with fixed IP or on a dialup (DSL, cable, etc) line? If dialup, those ranges are most of the time flagged as suspicious because most of the time, computers sending out mails directly from dialup are zombified end user pcs sending out spam. Use a smarthost or a server with a fixed ip (a hosted Vserver or dedicated server) will solve this. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- hyeroo 路 2023-12-15 22:09 I have a vserver with a fixed IP ---------------------------------------------------------------------- hyeroo 路 2023-12-15 22:10 Thank you. I have enabled DMARC, and fixed another error in the diagnostic. Now, when I write an email, I will just press send with my fingers crossed. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand 路 2023-12-15 22:41 Sometimes it gets better with time. As the servers start to see mail from you and their customers are replying to your messages, you get some reputation and messages will no longer be marked as spam. Also, new domains are sometimes penalised, so if you have an older domain it can help to use that for email. If you can, ask recipients to make sure they mark any misclassified messages from your server as "not spam". But unfortunately it's all a big black box and there's no real way to fix anything for sure. :-( ---------------------------------------------------------------------- adamshand 路 2023-12-15 22:55 Just as a side thought. You could try using an SMTP relay for a few months to build up some positive reputation for your domain, and then try going back to purely selfhosting. I haven't tried that and don't know if it would work, but maybe?