Recent­ly, a read­er asked how they could change the MX records for their site? 

MX records (Mail Exchange records) are nec­es­sary for deliv­er­ing emails to your busi­ness email address. You’ll need to change them if you want to use G Suite or oth­er email ser­vices with your own domain name. 

In this arti­cle, we’ll show how to eas­i­ly change MX records for your Word­Press domain name. 

What Are MX Records and Why Change Them?

MX records (Mail Exchange records) are a spe­cial type of DNS record. It tells the inter­net servers where to send emails com­ing to and from your web­site domain name. 

For instance, if you want to use Google Work­space to cre­ate a pro­fes­sion­al email address with your domain name (such as name@yoursite.com), then you need to route all your emails through Gmail’s servers. 

Sim­i­lar­ly, if you want­ed to use an SMTP ser­vice provider to send Word­Press emails, then you’ll need to add MX records to send your emails using SMTP.

Impor­tant: Before you begin, you need the details for your new MX records. Your busi­ness email provider should be able to sup­ply these. For instance, these are Google’s MX records for our domain.

That being said, let’s take a look at how to eas­i­ly change MX records for your Word­Press website. 

Since this is a com­pre­hen­sive tuto­r­i­al, we have added quick links, so you can to jump straight to the sec­tion you need.

• Chang­ing MX Records Using Domain.com
• Chang­ing MX Records Using Bluehost
• Chang­ing MX Records Using SiteGround
• Chang­ing MX Records Using HostGator
• Chang­ing MX Records Using GoDaddy
• Chang­ing MX Records Using Namecheap

Changing MX Records Using Domain.com

Domain.com is the best domain name reg­is­trar on the market. 

If your domain name is reg­is­tered with Domain.com, then you can fol­low the instruc­tions below. 

Tip: Want to reg­is­ter a new domain for send­ing emails? Make sure you use our Domain.com coupon code to get a 25% discount.

First, you need to sign in to your Domain.com account and click the DNS & Name­servers link on the left hand side.

If you have mul­ti­ple domains, then make sure the right one is select­ed in the bread­crumb nav­i­ga­tion at the top of the screen.

Next, scroll down the list of DNS records to find the MX entries for your domain. You need to click the 3 ver­ti­cal dots next to the first MX record and then click the Edit link.

You will now see a pop­up where you are able to edit your MX record. Sim­ply enter the new MX record in the Con­tent box. We are using the G Suite MX record here.

You can leave the Name and Type set to their defaults. After that you need to enter the Con­tent, TTL (Time To Live), and Pri­or­i­ty as spec­i­fied by Google Work­space (for­mer­ly G Suite) or your email host. Then, click the Update DNS button.

Repeat the process for the oth­er MX entry, using the same MX record. That’s ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM in our case.

You should see your changed MX records in the list.

Con­grats, you have suc­cess­ful­ly updat­ed MX records for your domain name on Domain.com.

Changing MX Records Using Bluehost

Blue­host is the best Word­Press host­ing com­pa­ny on the mar­ket. They offer free domain name reg­is­tra­tion with every website.

If you reg­is­tered your domain name with Blue­host, then you can fol­low these instruc­tions to add MX records to your domain name. 

First, you need to log in to your Blue­host account and switch to the Domains tab in the left side­bar. After that, click on the Man­age drop­down menu next to your domain name and select DNS option.

You will then see the DNS details page for your domain.

Now, scroll down to the ‘MX (Mail Exchang­er)’ sec­tion. Go ahead and click the 3 ver­ti­cal dots next to the top MX record then select Edit.

You will now be able to edit the MX record. Sim­ply change the pri­or­i­ty, ‘Points To’ and TTL as spec­i­fied by G Suite or your email ser­vice provider. 

Don’t for­get to click on the ‘Update DNS’ but­ton to store your settings. 

Go ahead and repeat the edit­ing process for the oth­er MX record. For this one, you need to use the details for the sec­ond MX record spec­i­fied by G Suite or your email host.

You should then see your 2 MX records listed. 

Tip: Go ahead and use the Add Record but­ton to cre­ate fur­ther MX records, if your email host pro­vides them.

Changing MX Records Using SiteGround

Site­Ground is a pop­u­lar pre­mi­um Word­Press host­ing com­pa­ny that we use for WPBeginner’s web­site host­ing. You can get up to 63% off their host­ing using our Site­Ground coupon.

If your domain is reg­is­tered with Site­Ground, then you can fol­low the instruc­tions below to update your MX records.

First, you need to log in to your Site­Ground account and go to the Web­sites tab. Then, click the cPan­el but­ton next to your domain.

Next, scroll down to the Mail sec­tion of your cPan­el and click the ‘Advanced MX Edi­tor’ button.

Now, you need to select your cho­sen domain from the drop­down list.

After that, you need to select the Remote Mail Exchang­er option. Then, you can enter the Pri­or­i­ty and Des­ti­na­tion as spec­i­fied by G Suite or your email ser­vice provider.

Sim­ply click the Add New Record but­ton and your MX record will be added.

Changing MX Records Using HostGator

Host­Ga­tor is a large host­ing com­pa­ny that many Word­Press sites use. If you want to set up a Host­Ga­tor account, make sure you check out our Host­Ga­tor coupon to get 62% off, plus a free domain and SSL certificate.

Note: You’ll need a host­ing account with Host­Ga­tor in order to update your MX records. You can’t change your MX records if you just have a domain reg­is­tered there.

If you reg­is­tered your domain and have a host­ing account with Host­Ga­tor, then you can fol­low the instruc­tions below to update your MX records.

First, you need to log in to your Host­Ga­tor account. Then, click the Host­ing tab in your sidebar.

Below your domain’s name, click on the cPan­el link.

Now, cPan­el will load in a new tab. First, click on the Email link on the left hand side. This will jump you down to the Email sec­tion of the page, where you need to click on the ‘MX Entry’ button.

Next, scroll down the MX Records page to the MX Records sec­tion. Sim­ply click Edit next to the exist­ing record.

Now, you can change the pri­or­i­ty to 1 and the des­ti­na­tion to ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM in the box­es that appear below the orig­i­nal record. Click the Edit but­ton to save those changes.

You will then see the new record list­ed. You can also add new MX records using the Add New Record but­ton above this.

Changing MX Records Using GoDaddy

GoDad­dy is a pop­u­lar web host­ing and domain name com­pa­ny. They’re offer­ing WPBe­gin­ner read­ers host­ing for just $1.00/month plus a free domain. You can find out more details when you use our GoDad­dy coupon.

If you reg­is­tered your domain with GoDad­dy, you can fol­low the instruc­tions below to update your MX records.

First, log in to your GoDad­dy account. Next, click the DNS drop­down in the nav­i­ga­tion menu and select Man­age Zones.

Next, you need to search for the domain that you want to use. This domain needs to be one you’ve already reg­is­tered with GoDad­dy.

Once you’ve select­ed your domain, scroll down the page and you will see a list of records. Here, you need to find and edit your MX records. If you don’t have any MX records, then sim­ply click the Add but­ton below the list.

Next, select MX from the Type drop­down list. You should then enter the details of your first MX record. For G Suite, those details are:

• Host: @
• Points to: ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM
• Pri­or­i­ty: 1

Go ahead and click the Save but­ton to save your MX record.

You will then see your record in the list. To add anoth­er MX record, sim­ply click the Add but­ton again.

Changing MX Records Using Namecheap

Namecheap is anoth­er pop­u­lar domain name reg­is­tra­tion com­pa­ny, offer­ing great val­ue domains.

If you reg­is­tered your domain with Namecheap, just fol­low the instruc­tions below to update your MX records.

First, go ahead and log in to your Namecheap account. After that, you need to go to Domain List » Advanced DNS.

Next, scroll down the page to the Mail Set­tings sec­tion. Here, you need to click the drop­down link and select Cus­tom MX.

Now, you can enter the details for your MX record. For G Suite, those are:

• Host: @
• Mail Serv­er: ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM
• Pri­or­i­ty: 1
• TTL: 60

Then, sim­ply click the Save All Changes but­ton to save your new MX record.

You can go ahead and add more records too, using the Add New Record button.

Final Steps After Setting Up Your MX Records

After set­ting your MX records, make sure you fol­low any oth­er steps for set­ting up your email or SMTP account cor­rect­ly. For help with Google Work­space (for­mer­ly G Suite), check out our step by step instruc­tions on set­ting up a pro­fes­sion­al email address with Gmail and G Suite.

Next, you may need to set up your Word­Press site to send email using your email / SMTP ser­vice provider. 

To do that, you’ll need WP Mail SMTP plu­g­in. It allows you to eas­i­ly route all your Word­PRess emails using SMTP with­out any com­pli­cat­ed set up.

For detailed instruc­tions, take a look at our ulti­mate guide on set­ting up WP Mail SMTP with any host.

We hope this arti­cle helped you learn how to change MX records for your Word­Press site. You might also like our arti­cle on how to cre­ate an email newslet­ter, and how to add web­site push noti­fi­ca­tions in Word­Press to com­mu­ni­cate with your customers.

If you liked this arti­cle, then please sub­scribe to our YouTube Chan­nel for Word­Press video tuto­ri­als. You can also find us on Twit­ter and Face­book.

The post How to Change MX Records for Your Word­Press Site (Step by Step) appeared first on WPBe­gin­ner.