Ask HN: Replacement for Rackspace SMTP Hosting?
23 comments
·February 28, 2025majodev
Made the switch to self-hosted https://mailu.io (on k8s) 2 years ago when Gandi announced the deprecation of their free plan.
Happy after IP was off most blocklists, but setup was kinda rough - https://mxtoolbox.com is your friend.
selfhoster
I've been selfhosting my email for around 3 decades. Currently hosting for free thanks to Oracle Cloud's generous always free resources. Running Wireguard there, then it routes ports I've designated over Wireguard to my home machine.
metadat
Oracle constantly kills my free instance, it's not reliable without frequent manual intervention. It's more like a "try it, see for yourself, we have a real cloud, but no guarantees" freebie toy.
I know they absolutely do cull free instances to make capacity for paying customers.
kristianpaul
Can you share your setup? General arch and spam handling
ireflect
Been self-hosting for over 15 years for both personal and professional email, including clients. Currently using docker-mailserver. The claims that deliverability is worse when self-hosting are greatly exaggerated. It's not perfect, but it's certainly no worse than Gmail or Google Workspace for business.
realslimjd
I've been using Purelymail¹ for a few years now. It's simple and it just works. The one time I needed support I emailed Scott and he got right back to me.
srhngpr
Amazon SES - been using it for years across all personal emails! $0.10/1000 emails sent with no minimum fees: https://aws.amazon.com/ses/pricing/
icameron
Following this, after having SMTP in house for years and years just fine (IIS6) I’m told the server is decommissioned. Sometimes we send 20,000k in a day, but that’s when an announcement goes out. Otherwise it’s a few dozen registration emails per day. I was thinking of installing postfix on a Linux VM on the same IP and letting it ride. So used to paying zilch and having it running on a web server that’s for other things.
throwawayaghas1
Checkout namecrane $10 a year https://namecrane.com/store/email-hosting-deals
zeagle
I happily used Migadu but switched to iCloud. The bus factor for my family is 1 with technical knowledge whereas with domains paid up for 10 years and iCloud family it is higher.
skeptrune
Forward Email is a reasonable option. It's fully open source and only $3/mo for unlimited domains. I also appreciate that it supports CalDAV.
fwdemail
Thanks @skeptrune
The community here is welcome to use coupon code "HN" for 100% off discount for one month via Stripe Checkout (not PayPal).
rglover
Check out ImprovMX [1]. Main feature is forwarding but they have an SMTP option for $9/mo (6K emails).
Just got email, Rackspace increases monthly minimum to $12 (was $10) for basic SMTP hosting.
I barely use it, but I like having a solid, independent, third-party, basic SMTP host around for when it is useful.
Name me a suggestion. I know 20% or $2 increase isn't much, but I don't want to pay that much for something I barely use, but I need something.
This unwanted fee increase has me jumping ship, not sure where to yet.
Thanks.