Having the same @gmail.com or @outlook.com email address domain as everyone else can get boring after a while. If you want to stand out for fun or to promote your own brand, you can set up a custom email domain (@yoursite.com), but it’s not always easy or affordable.
However, you may not have realized there’s an easier option: iCloud+. Using this, anyone can get a custom email domain for a low cost and minimal setup. I recently added one, and I want to take you through the process.
Requirements for an iCloud+ custom email domain
Normally, setting up a custom email domain involves several steps, including paying a hosting provider for email. This isn’t terribly difficult, but for most people, it’s too expensive to bother with unless they need it for a business.
One of the perks of iCloud+ is the option to use a custom domain for your email address. This is available with any paid iCloud+ plan, which starts at $1/month. Apple’s option handles the technical part of verifying your domain ownership through DNS, simplifying the process. And you can keep using the iCloud Mail interface you’re familiar with.
If you already subscribe to iCloud+, this is a bonus. For those who don’t use iCloud+ yet, $12/year is the cheapest option you’ll find for the job.
To use this feature, your Apple account must have two-factor authentication turned on. You can’t add a personalized email address that’s used for another Apple account. You also must have iCloud Mail set up on your account, which you can confirm by visiting icloud.com/mail.
First: decide on a domain
We’ll walk through the steps to get a custom domain using the iCloud website, though you can also do this on your iPhone or Mac. After subscribing to any iCloud+ plan, visit icloud.com/icloudplus and sign in if needed. On this page, click Custom Email Domain.
You’ll see a prompt to Buy a Domain or Use a Domain You Own. In case you already have one, click the latter and follow the steps to add your domain. This involves confirming any email addresses you already have and updating the DNS records to point your mail to iCloud.
Assuming you don’t already own a domain, it’s worth shopping around for the best price first. Apple’s process will have you purchase through Cloudflare, but that’s not necessarily the cheapest option. For example, I searched for a domain I wanted using Apple’s wizard, and it quoted a price of $10.46/year.
Using a comparison site like TLD-List, you can check what other companies charge. For instance, the cheapest registration for the same domain is $5.87 for the first year, while other registrars offer discounts for multi-year registrations.
Comparison tools are also good for seeing if your desired name is cheaper with a different top-level domain (TLD). I found that the same domain ending in “.top” or “.xyz” would be less expensive—at least for the first year.
However, there are tradeoffs here. While an unusual domain likely comes at a lower cost, it’s more prone to getting flagged as spam. I’d recommend going with a .com address if you can, due to its familiarity. If not, TLDs like .me or .family are fun alternatives that can help you keep the name short.
Make sure the domain is easy to dictate, since you’ll give it to people over the phone and in person.
Buying your domain
The Buy a Domain option will send you to Cloudflare to complete the purchase, which is what I did. I chose to buy a “.com” domain this way, as it was the best combination of upfront and renewal costs. I liked the idea of a “.family” domain, but it was three times as expensive.
Proceed through the steps to purchase your domain, which requires you to specify your name, address, and payment info. When you buy through Apple’s option, your domain will be automatically set up to work with iCloud Mail.
Be aware that most registrars, including Cloudflare, will enable automatic renewals on your domain. You can disable this to avoid paying for an unwanted subscription, though the fee to reactivate a lapsed domain is higher than renewing it.
I was told to return to the iCloud site and wait a few minutes for my domain to be recognized, but this didn’t happen automatically. I exited and clicked the Custom Email Domain option again, where my domain was recognized and I could proceed with setup.
Confirming your domain in iCloud
Next, you’ll need to specify whether this domain will be for Only You, or if you want to add extra email addresses for family and friends now. If you want to add others and have an Apple Family Sharing group, everyone in that group will be added by default. Otherwise, you can invite anyone you’d like. You can share the domain with five other people, and each person can have up to three email addresses on the domain.
To finalize, add the first email address you want to use with the new domain—this will be your own. You can create additional email addresses on the domain as needed.
There’s one other option to consider: Allow All Incoming Messages. If you enable this, any mail that comes to your domain and doesn’t match an existing email address will be forwarded to yours. It’s worth enabling this so you don’t miss emails sent to a mistyped address, or general addresses like contact@. If you end up getting a lot of spam, turn it off.
Using Your Custom Email Addresses
Once you’ve added your custom domain address to iCloud, it functions a lot like an iCloud Mail alias. Any mail sent to your custom domain address will appear in your existing iCloud Mail inbox. When you create a new email, the From box lets you choose which address it comes from.
You don’t get a separate inbox, so you’ll need to use rules to sort incoming mail into different folders.
Remember that your iCloud Mail counts against your storage limit, so you may need to free up space in iCloud if you want to use it as your primary inbox.
A custom email domain is much cooler
If you’ve wanted to stand out from the usual email providers, iCloud+’s custom email domains are an easy, cheap way. $12/year for iCloud+ and as little as $11/year for a domain registration isn’t much, and the whole process only takes a few minutes.
In case this is your first web domain, you should know that purchasing a domain is like buying the land before building a house. When you visit your website, you’ll see a “parked domain” placeholder page, letting you know the site is registered, but there’s nothing there yet.
You don’t need to have hosting to use a custom email address, and owning the domain means someone else can’t take it. But if you want content on your website, you’ll need to sign up with a hosting provider, which is a separate expense.
