
Ask HN: Do I “need” a custom domain email? - question-email
I&#x27;ve been using a custom domain email for the past year, and I&#x27;ve loved the experience.<p>I want to switch to Fastmail but I&#x27;m having trouble justifying it to myself.<p>Should I give up and move back to Gmail?
Do I want to pay Fastmail&#x27;s $50&#x2F;yr to have a &quot;more professional&quot; (custom domain) email?
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__d
No, because GMail works, and anyone who needs email can use it. Or one of its
competitors.

Yes, because your email is your identity, and that's a very good thing to own.
Unfortunately, you can only rent domain names. But once you do so, you can
control your email: it doesn't matter who your service provider is, your
address is the same.

Of course, you could trust GMail (or whoever) to have T&Cs that you're happy
with, but if one day that changes, you're stuck.

A cheaper alternative to Fastmail's $50 is to use POBox.com's $20 redirection
and point it to GMail. $20 + annual DNS rental, and you can switch email
provider at will.

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the_common_man
Since price seems to be a concern, why not selfhost? Get yourself a cheap
server and you can create unlimited mailboxes with many selfhosted solutions
out there

~~~
__d
I think self-hosting is the wrong choice for most people.

The effort you need to put in to first build out the system, and then maintain
it, and all the while jump through the various hoops that are required to have
Google, Microsoft, Apple, etc, accept email from you, is significant.

$50/year is a bargain if you value your own time at minimum wage or more.

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clintonb
You don't "need" a custom email domain. A custom email looks better to
customers if you are running a business.

That said, it's up to you and what you _want_.

