The DNS and Routing Side of Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 Print

What this covers

Setting up Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 on your domain comes down to two things happening in the right places: the correct DNS records pointing your domain at the provider, and the email routing on our side set so our server steps out of the way. This article explains both. It is the technical companion to our overview article on moving your email to Workspace or 365, which covers the bigger picture and the all-important business of migrating your existing mail.

Why we don't list the exact records here

You will notice this article does not give you specific MX values or record settings to copy. That is deliberate, and it is for your protection. Google and Microsoft change their required DNS records from time to time, and an article listing yesterday's values is an article that breaks someone's email tomorrow. So the single most important instruction is this: always use the exact records your provider gives you, from their own current setup instructions.

When you set up Workspace or 365, the provider shows you precisely which records to add for your domain, and those are the authoritative source, always more current than any third-party guide could be. Take the records from Google or Microsoft directly, and enter them exactly.

The records involved, in plain terms

You do not need to list them yourself, the provider does, but it helps to know what they are for, so the setup makes sense rather than being a blind copy:

• MX records are the key ones. They tell the world to deliver your domain's mail to Google or Microsoft instead of to us. Changing these is what actually moves your incoming mail.
• TXT records handle verification, proving to the provider that you own the domain, and email authentication, the SPF and related records covered in our article on why email lands in spam, which keep your outgoing mail trusted.
• CNAME records are often required, particularly by Microsoft 365, to point various service addresses at the provider.
• An SRV record may be needed for certain 365 features.

The provider's setup page lists exactly which of these your domain needs and what each should contain. Your job is to enter them accurately, and our article on editing DNS in cPanel covers doing that in the Zone Editor if you are making the changes yourself.

The step people forget: email routing on our side

This is the one that catches everyone, because it lives on our side rather than the provider's, so their instructions never mention it. Even with your MX records correctly pointing at Google or Microsoft, our server needs to be told it is no longer responsible for your domain's mail. Otherwise mail generated on our server, your website's contact form, order confirmations from your shop, and mail from other domains on the same server, gets delivered locally into old cPanel mailboxes instead of being sent on to your real inbox at Google or Microsoft.

The fix is one setting:

1. In cPanel, open Email Routing.
2. Select your domain.
3. Change the setting from Local Mail Exchanger to Remote Mail Exchanger.

This tells our server your mail lives elsewhere now, and to hand it on rather than keep it. Missing this step is the single most common cause of "some of my mail works but my contact form emails vanish" after a move, and our article on email going to the wrong place after moving providers covers that exact symptom in full.

Getting the order right

The sequence matters, to avoid a gap where mail has nowhere to go:

1. Create your mailboxes at Google or Microsoft first.
2. Migrate your existing mail across, as the overview article covers.
3. Add the provider's DNS records, including the MX change.
4. Set Email Routing to Remote on our side.
5. Allow for propagation, up to 48 hours, and keep the old mailboxes until you have confirmed everything is flowing correctly.

Do it yourself, or let us handle it

If you are comfortable following the provider's record list and making DNS changes carefully, this is doable yourself, and the articles linked throughout cover each piece. But there are several moving parts, and a mistake in any of them interrupts your email, which is why many clients would rather it were simply done correctly. Open a support ticket and we will handle the DNS records and the routing, and coordinate the switch so your mail keeps flowing, you bring the provider's record list from your Workspace or 365 setup, and we will put it in place properly.

Good to know

Two things separate a smooth Workspace or 365 setup from a painful one. First, always take the DNS records from the provider's own current instructions rather than any list that might be out of date, including this article's deliberately general one. Second, never forget the Email Routing setting on our side, it is invisible in the provider's guides and it is the step that quietly breaks website and system mail when missed. Get those two right, in the right order, and the rest is straightforward.