
Ask HN: Alternatives to Google-Apps Custom Domain Email Hosting - evo_9
I&#x27;m trying to find a good alternative to google-apps  free custom domain email hosting for a client that doesn&#x27;t want use there services.  Doesn&#x27;t necessarily have to be free but it does need to support custom domains.
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toomuchtodo
Fastmail business account:
[https://www.fastmail.fm/help/receive/domains.html](https://www.fastmail.fm/help/receive/domains.html)

~~~
napoleond
Another vote for fastmail--it's a fantastic service. I prefer it to Google's
in many ways.

~~~
IgorPartola
Do they still do that awesome thing where if your invoice isn't paid they
delete all your mail and give you no way to recover it? This has actually
happened to someone I know, where he didn't respond to the invoice fast
enough.

Edit: I should say that of course they need to have a recourse to stop
providing services to people who don't pay. However, giving maybe 30 to 90
days to at least download your mail after your payment is late would be nicer
than going "remember years of email you have saved here? Say goodbye to it
all".

~~~
kgrin
As the "someone" in question, I should clarify that the core screw-up was that
the invoice emails were going to the account's "master" mailbox, which was
unmonitored because the domain it was managing was being forwarded (IIRC I
couldn't figure out how to forward the master mailbox or something).

This was a while ago, so my memory may be failing me, but I'm fairly certain
we had an alternate "recovery" address set up - just no one thought to send an
invoice there, or call the phone number on file, or whatever... it was a "hey,
you show no signs of having received the invoice, so we assume you're a PITA
deadbeat and we're going to perma-delete the account for you!"

Moral of the story (from my perspective) - if a customer isn't responding to
your invoice, it might just be that they don't have it... try to reach on them
a side channel before cutting off service!

------
vital101
I've been using [https://www.zoho.com/](https://www.zoho.com/) and its been
working out quite well. Although I only need one account at the moment.

~~~
godDLL
Another vote for Zoho, should really be your first option as it's free.

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dejv
I am using Zoho Mail, web client is not on the Gmail level, but it works well
and it is free.

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posttool
I recently used [https://github.com/onddo/postfix-dovecot-
cookbook](https://github.com/onddo/postfix-dovecot-cookbook) with success and
ease! Has anyone else? I wouldn't mind sharing my setup project if interested.

------
youpi
Hello,

First time I comment on Hacker News, but several years of silent reading :)

I wanted to find a mailbox where I feel at home in it, and keep my gmail as a
secondary box.

I discovered mailbox.org this summer on Hacker News
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7864392](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7864392)

and decided to move with a custom domain :

1 euro per month, 12 euro per year, whereas fastmail asks for 40$ per year

I'm very happy, because :

\- Mailbox Imap sync \- Address book sync \- Calendar sync

work great on my iPhone, and that was my functional priorities

I don't use the drive (100 Go) nor the GPG. I prefered gmail interface,
because of habitude, but that's fine.

But I really appreciate to feel at home and alone, when I'm in my inbox :-)

Thank you, mailbox.org team :)

------
hackuser
Rackspace's hosted mail services are very good. I've used the hosted Exchange
($10/mailbox/month) and they have a lower-end service for $2/mailbox/month.

Support and reliability have been exceptional.

------
ummjackson
[https://mailinabox.email/](https://mailinabox.email/) on a 1gb DigitalOcean
droplet. Will cost $10/mo and you get full control / unlimited accounts and
aliases.

~~~
apaprocki
Curious if anyone here (possibly besides parent) who is running this in
production? I thought it looked like the best option for a custom configurable
stack (and keeping it up-to-date with security fixes), but there are so many
moving parts in a full e-mail stack. Any experiences good or bad?

~~~
mattmanser
It is absolute insanity to run your own email unless you have a sysadmin team.

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fredsted
Virtualmin: [http://virtualmin.com](http://virtualmin.com)

Setup a supported Linux distribution on any cloud provider (eg. Linode,
DigitalOcean) and run the Virtualmin 1-liner on it. 10 minutes later you'll
have a control panel where you can create domains. Each domain can have Web
sites, email accounts, git repositories, databases, DNS management, and more.
Don't want to use half of those things? Turn them off. You can add as many as
you want and it's open source. It works great.

~~~
colinbartlett
While I like the suggestion of something so easy and quick to setup, I dislike
the idea that it will be my responsibility to maintain any sort of hosted VM.

How long before I'm scrambling to patch updates or recover some kind of hack?

~~~
fredsted
You can always enable automatic security updates. I've been running this for 3
or 4 years, haven't had to do anything special besides paying bills.

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freetonik
This one is pretty good and it's free, but it's Russian –
[https://pdd.yandex.ru/](https://pdd.yandex.ru/)

The user interface for end clients actually has an option for both English and
Russian.

If you worry about "weird foreign website", don't, this is Yandex, a large,
famous, public company
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yandex](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yandex)

------
philip1209
I wish there was a simple domain email service targeted at individuals rather
than businesses. Allow wildcard forwarding of email at the domain to specified
email address (e.g. for parked domains or retired ones). Allow arbitrary smtp
access at the domain for any email using the same password (plus DKIM & SPF
support). I'd pay Google Apps prices for something simple that accomplished
this.

~~~
ecesena
With Google Domains you get 100 email forwards and one of them could be * (I'm
using this config). The cost is just the domain registration, e.g. $12/y for a
.com.

~~~
philip1209
Yes, but I don't like using Google authoritative DNS. Also, I'm not sure if
they make DKIM accessible.

~~~
ecesena
As far as I can see from the console, you can both change the DNS servers (if
you don't like Google's ones) and edit the zone file. So, I guess, you could
support DKIM via another SMTP, e.g. Amazon SES. (please note that I have no
affiliation with G domains, I'm just trying to reply to the original question
to the best of my knowledge)

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milliams
My Kolab ([https://mykolab.com/](https://mykolab.com/)) might be just what you
want.

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omgmog
I've been using "Atmail Cloud" for about 18 months now and have had no issues,
I've got about 20 domains using the service.
[https://www.atmail.com/product](https://www.atmail.com/product)

------
falava
I use Gandi.net email[1], included with a 12€ domain you get 5 email accounts
(POP and IMAP), 1GB shared, 1000 redirects and upgrades are also cheap.

[1][http://wiki.gandi.net/en/mail](http://wiki.gandi.net/en/mail)

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vinayp10
You can use outlook from microsoft for free...

[http://www.process.st/2014/04/small-business-in-the-cloud-
go...](http://www.process.st/2014/04/small-business-in-the-cloud-google-apps-
or-microsoft-office-365/)

~~~
Mithrandir
Microsoft ended free custom domain support earlier this year [0]. To use
custom domains with Outlook.com, you either have to have already configured
Outlook to use a domain name or pay $5/user/month for Office 365 [1].

0: [http://microsoft-news.com/microsoft-ends-custom-domain-
suppo...](http://microsoft-news.com/microsoft-ends-custom-domain-support-for-
outlook-com-suggests-users-to-office-365-migration/)

1: [http://products.office.com/en-us/business/compare-
office-365...](http://products.office.com/en-us/business/compare-
office-365-for-business-plans)

------
pfooti
Check out Pobox: [https://www.pobox.com](https://www.pobox.com)

I don't use it, but a friend of mine does and has lots of good things to say
about it. Wildcard forwarding, hosted email, good privacy policy, etc etc.

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hackertoolbox
Thanks for asking the question.

I saved all the tools to the box :) Will check back later.
[http://www.hackertoolbox.com/tags/email%20hosting](http://www.hackertoolbox.com/tags/email%20hosting)

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wopsky
I use Zoho Mail. It allows for custom domain email for up to 10 users for
free.

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eldavido
Is anyone else's spam protection on par with Google Mail's? That's the GApps
killer feature. The rest of their groupware suite, especially Writely/Document
editing, is pretty mediocre, IMO.

~~~
hackuser
> Is anyone else's spam protection on par with Google Mail's?

In my experience, good spam protection is a commodity.

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bruno_rocca
Use zoho for several clients for under 10 for free, but looking for the next
level up to 25 as well. Must be something other than fast mail and Google

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trumbitta2
[https://www.fastmail.com/](https://www.fastmail.com/) works well and the
price is fair.

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xtrumanx
I thought Google Apps email wasn't free anymore? Didn't they stop offering it
around late 2012?

~~~
grecy
Correct. It's no longer free.

I have it on an older domain, and it's still free, grandfathered in.

I recently signed up with a new domain, and I'm paying for it on that domain.

~~~
K-Wall
If you sign into the admin panel of the grandfathered domain you can add the
new domain to that Google Apps Account.

Granted any settings will effect all the domains associated with that account.

~~~
patrickdavey
I realise HN doesn't like people saying 'thanks, me too'... however... in this
particular case I just wanted to say "Thanks!!!" ... I'd not realised you
could do this and I'm now 5 minutes into migrating a few domains across.
Brilliant.

------
jonnw
I recommend Zoho. Been using it for a while now, no regrets.

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wnevets
google domains

~~~
xxdesmus
not at all a Google Apps alternative.

~~~
wnevets
care to explain? Google domains has nothing to do with Google Apps other than
sharing the google name.

