cPanel has three e-mail features that do similar-sounding things and get confused constantly - and picking the wrong one means lost messages or a mailbox full of rubbish. Here they are.
| Feature |
In one line |
| E-mail account |
A real mailbox, with a password and space. It is the only one that stores messages - see how to create an e-mail account |
| Forwarder |
A rule that sends elsewhere everything arriving at an address. It takes no space and has no password. |
| Catch-all |
Catches everything sent to addresses on your domain that do not exist. |
Forwarders: the most used rule
Created under Email → Forwarders. It suits an address you want to publish but not manage: hello@ landing in the mailbox of whoever answers, invoices@ going to accounts, or a department address reaching three people at once.
| Good for |
Bad for |
| A public name that reaches one person |
Receiving and storing: a rule keeps nothing. If the destination fails, the message is gone. |
| Several recipients on one address |
Replying. You cannot reply from a forwarder - that needs an account. |
| Addresses that change owner |
Sending everything to a Gmail. See the warning below. |
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Forwarding everything to a Gmail hurts deliverability. Our server ends up sending Gmail messages that claim to come from third parties. Even with SPF correct, a share of them land in spam at the other end, and the domain's reputation suffers for it. If you want to read everything in Gmail, connect the mailbox over IMAP instead. See SPF, DKIM and DMARC.
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Aliases: several names, one mailbox
In cPanel, an e-mail alias is a forwarder pointed at your own mailbox. It gives one person several names: john@, j.smith@ and sales@ all arriving in the same place.
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To reply using one of those names. In webmail or in your mail program, add the alternative address as an identity. You can then choose, when replying, which name appears - with no second mailbox and nothing more to pay. See how to access your webmail.
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Catch-all: useful, and dangerous if forgotten
Set under Email → Default Address. It catches messages sent to addresses that do not exist on your domain - typos like suport@ instead of support@, or the address of someone who left the company.
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Switched on and forgotten, it fills with spam. Spam robots try names at random on every domain they find - admin@, info@, anna@, hundreds a day. With catch-all on, all of it lands in one mailbox, which fills up and starts refusing good mail. It is the most common cause of «my mailbox filled up out of nowhere».
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cPanel's default option is the saner one: Discard - refuse with a notice to the sender. Whoever mistyped gets a message back saying the address does not exist, and corrects it. That beats catching everything in silence.
| Use catch-all when |
Do not use it when |
| You are migrating and do not know every address |
You want it permanently. Turn it on, see what arrives, create the missing accounts, and turn it off. |
| The domain is new and there is no spam yet |
The domain is old and well known. By then the volume of attempts is already large. |
| For a short, watched period |
As a permanent safety net. For that, create the accounts properly. |
Which to choose, in three questions
| 1 |
Do you need to reply from that address? Then it is an account, or an identity added to an account you already have.
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| 2 |
Do you need messages stored at that address? Then it is an account. Forwarders keep nothing - unless you tick the option to retain a copy.
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| 3 |
Is it only so messages reach somebody? Then it is a forwarder, and it uses no space at all.
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If the domain has more than one name pointing here, there is also the domain alias, which is a different thing - see parked domains (aliases).
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Not sure which of the three solves your case?
Talk to us
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