How it works
Find out why your newsletters, invoices or contact-form emails land in spam, before your customers tell you.
Copy the one-time address and send your real newsletter, invoice or contact-form message to it, from the same tool and address you normally use.
The tester reads the message as a receiving mail server would: who sent it, whether it is signed, whether the server is trusted, and what the message contains.
You get a score out of 10 and a plain list of what passed and what to fix, with the exact DNS records that were found.
What we check
Each check is shown in your report with the points it cost.
A DNS record that lists the servers allowed to send email for your domain. We check that the server that sent your message is on the list.
A digital signature on each message. We verify it against the public key in your DNS, so you know the message was not changed on the way.
Tells receivers what to do when SPF and DKIM fail, and requires one of them to match your From address. Gmail and Yahoo expect it from bulk senders.
Whether the server has reverse DNS that points back to it, introduces itself with a real name and delivers with TLS encryption.
Whether the sending server’s address is on well-known spam blocklists such as Spamhaus, SpamCop and UCEPROTECT.
Required headers, unsubscribe headers, a plain-text version, image-only messages, link shorteners, mismatched links and risky attachments.
Raise your score
Most low scores come from the same few problems. Fix these first, then test again.
01
Add the SPF and DKIM records your email provider gives you, then add a DMARC record starting with p=none. These three account for most of the score.
02
Use an address such as hello@yourdomain.com with your provider’s mail server. Email sent straight from a web server, or from a free address, is far more likely to be junked.
03
Include real text, add a plain-text version, link to full addresses instead of shortened links, and keep images as a supplement, not the whole message.
9 or 10 means the technical setup is right. Between 7 and 9, fix the items marked in the report. Below 7, some mail providers are likely to put the message in spam.
SPF is a DNS record that lists the servers allowed to send email for your domain.
DKIM adds a digital signature to each message, so the receiver can check that it really came from your domain and was not changed on the way.
DMARC tells receivers what to do when SPF and DKIM fail, and requires that at least one of them matches the domain in the From address.
The most common reasons are missing or failing SPF, DKIM or DMARC, a sending server on a blocklist or without reverse DNS, and content that looks like spam: link shorteners, image-only messages, or links that show one address and lead to another. The report checks each of these.
Every test starts at 10. Points are taken off for each problem found, with the largest deductions for failed authentication and blocklist listings. The report shows how many points each section cost.
No. The message is deleted from the test mailbox as soon as it has been scored. Only the report is kept, for 7 days, so you can share its link. The report shows the sender address and subject but not the message text.
Most messages arrive within a minute. If nothing arrives, check that you sent to the exact address shown, look for a bounce message in your own inbox, and try again. A bounce usually means your sending server was rejected, which is a deliverability problem in itself.
Try it
Send one message to your test address and get your score in about a minute.
More tools: Website checker · DNS checker
