cPanel email: what beginners need to know

A `@gmail.com` address on a business card sends a signal: the company did not bother. If you already own a domain name and hosting, the professional address is included. It takes three minutes to create.

Creating the address

In cPanel, under Email, open Email Accounts, then Create.

Three fields:

• the address: the part before the `@`
• the password: long and randomly generated, since you will almost never type it
• the quota: the space allowed. 1 GB is plenty for a contact inbox; 5 GB if you receive heavy attachments

The account exists immediately. You can read it from webmail, at `yourdomain.com/webmail`.

Which addresses to create

The reflex is to create one per person. Create above all the ones that outlast departures:

• `info@` or `hello@` — the public address, the one on the site and the cards
• `accounting@` — for invoices, which should not sit in the inbox of an employee who has left
• one named address per person, `firstname@`

For a small team, an alias is often better than a mailbox: `sales@` forwarding to two people costs no storage and needs no configuration.

The setting that keeps you out of the spam folder

This is the part everyone skips, and the only one that really matters. A badly configured address sends emails that land in your customers' junk mail.

Three DNS records to check with your host:

• SPF: says which servers are allowed to send on your behalf
• DKIM: signs your messages to prove they were not altered
• DMARC: tells receivers what to do with messages that fail the first two tests

cPanel generates them automatically in most cases. After creating your first address, send a test message to a Gmail address and check that it arrives in the main inbox, not in junk.

Reading your email somewhere other than webmail

Webmail works in a pinch, but nobody wants to live there. In cPanel, each account displays its connection settings for Outlook, Apple Mail or your phone's app.

Always choose IMAP, never POP3: with IMAP, messages stay on the server and sync between your computer and your phone. With POP3, a message read on the phone disappears from the computer.

The limits to know about

Shared hosting imposes a ceiling on messages per hour — often 200 to 500. Enough for correspondence, not enough for a newsletter. To send in bulk you need a dedicated service; otherwise the host blocks the send, and it is your domain reputation that pays.