Creating, Disabling and Managing Email Accounts in Plesk

This guide explains how to create email addresses in your Plesk panel, manage existing addresses and turn the mail service on or off for a domain. It applies to both Linux and Windows Plesk hosting accounts; differences between the two are noted.

Menu and button names are those of Plesk's English interface.

Creating an email address

1. Go to Mail and click Create Email Address.
2. In Email address, type the part of the address before the @ sign. If your account has several domains, you can choose the domain for the address from the list next to it.
3. In Password, set the mailbox password. It must be at least five Latin characters long; we recommend a long password that is hard to guess.
4. Leave Mailbox selected and set the mailbox size. If you leave the size empty, the default size of your hosting plan is used.
5. Click OK.

Other options on the form:

• Can be used to log in to Plesk: if selected, the owner of this address can also log in to Plesk with the mailbox password. Plesk creates an additional user with limited permissions for this person. We recommend leaving it off for people who only use the address for email.
• External email address: another address to which the password reset link is sent if access to the mailbox is lost.
• The maximum number of outgoing email messages: the maximum number of messages that can be sent per hour. This field is shown only if outgoing mail limits are switched on on the server.
• Description in Plesk: a short note about the address, shown in the list in the Mail section.

Changing the password

In Mail, click the address, type and confirm the new password, then click OK.

Once saved, Plesk never shows an email account's password. If you have forgotten it, you can set a new one this way. After changing it, also enter the new password in the mail apps on the phones and computers where you use the address.

Mailbox size and usage

You can see how full each mailbox is in the Usage column of the list in Mail. Click Refresh Usage Stats for up-to-date values.

Email sent to a full mailbox is rejected and returned to the sender. If a mailbox is nearly full, you can delete old messages or increase its size:

1. In Mail, click the address.
2. In Another size, type the new size and choose the unit.
3. Click OK.

The mailbox size cannot exceed the default size defined in your hosting plan. If you need a larger mailbox, you can open a support ticket.

Forwarding

To send copies of the email arriving at an address to other addresses:

1. In Mail, click the address and open the Forwarding tab.
2. Select Switch on mail forwarding.
3. Enter the addresses to forward to. Separate several addresses with spaces, commas or semicolons, or put each on its own line.
4. Click OK.

If you do not want to keep copies of forwarded messages in this mailbox, you can clear Mailbox in the address settings; the address then works only as a forwarder. To stop forwarding, clear Switch on mail forwarding and save.

Aliases (additional addresses)

An alias gives a mailbox a second address; email sent to the alias lands in the same mailbox. For example, you can use it to collect email sent to sales@ in the john@ mailbox.

1. In Mail, click the address and open the Email Aliases tab.
2. Type the new address in Email alias and click OK.

To remove an alias, click Remove next to it on the same tab. If an alias you have published online starts receiving spam, removing it and creating a new one is a practical solution.

Auto-reply

You can reply automatically to incoming email while you are on leave or out of the office:

1. In Mail, click the address and open the Auto-Reply tab.
2. Select Switch on auto-reply.
3. Enter the subject and text of the reply. We recommend keeping the Plain text format, as some recipients may not display HTML messages correctly.
4. If you like, set an end date with Switch off auto-reply on so that replies stop automatically when you are back.
5. Click OK.

By default, the same sender receives an automatic reply only once a day; you can change this on the same tab. To also forward incoming messages to another address, use the Forward to field. To switch auto-reply off, clear Switch on auto-reply and save.

Spam filter

1. In Mail, click the address and open the Spam Filter tab.
2. Select Switch on spam filtering for this email address.
3. Choose what to do with messages classified as spam and click OK.

Options:

• Move spam to the Spam folder (Linux only): spam is moved to the Spam folder of the mailbox. Messages in this folder are deleted automatically after 30 days, so we recommend checking it from time to time so you do not miss an important message. If you use the address over IMAP, you can make the filter more accurate over time by moving missed spam to the Spam folder and wrongly filtered messages back to the Inbox.
• Mark spam messages: messages are not deleted; a text of your choice is added to the beginning of the subject. Suitable if you want to sort spam with rules in your own mail app.
• Delete all spam messages: messages classified as spam are deleted immediately. We do not recommend this unless you are sure the filter is accurate; a message wrongly classified as spam cannot be recovered.

If the filter lets too much spam through or marks legitimate email as spam, you can adjust Spam filter sensitivity under Show Advanced Settings. The default is 7. Lowering the value makes the filter stricter, raising it makes it more lenient. We recommend changing it by one at a time and watching the result for a few days.

Messages from the addresses and domains you enter in White list on the same tab are never treated as spam; messages from those in Black list are blocked. You can put each address on its own line. An asterisk (*) stands for several characters and a question mark (?) for a single character; for example, *@examplecompany.com covers every address in that domain.

Turning the mail service on and off for a domain

A domain's mail service is managed in Websites & Domains, in the domain's Mail Settings. Under Mail service on this domain you can choose one of the following:

If you use your email with an external service such as Gmail, you need to turn off the server's mail service for that domain; this is required for email to be delivered correctly. To turn it off, you can use Disabled for incoming mail on Linux or Disabled on Windows instead of Not configured.

If your hosting account has several domains, you can change the setting for all of them at once: in Mail, open the Mail Settings tab, select the domains and use Activate/Deactivate Services on the toolbar.

Email sent to addresses that do not exist

You can choose what happens to email sent to an address that does not exist in your domain (for example, a mistyped address) with Mail bounce settings in the domain's Mail Settings:

• Bounce with message: the email is returned to the sender with an error message. This is the default.
• Forward to address: all such email is forwarded to an address you choose (catch-all). If outgoing mail control is on on the server, this address must be in the same domain.
• Reject: the email is rejected without being accepted.

Outgoing email limits

If outgoing mail limits are switched on on the server, the number of messages your hosting account, each domain and each mailbox can send per hour is limited. A higher-level limit takes priority: once the hosting account's limit is reached, no domain or mailbox can send email, even if it has not reached its own limit. These settings appear in Plesk only when limits are switched on. If you need something like bulk sending, you can open a support ticket.

Using webmail

To reach your email in a browser, open webmail.example.com (replace example.com with your own domain). Use your full email address as the username and the mailbox password as the password.

When logged in to Plesk, you can also click the webmail icon next to the address in the Mail list. If the webmail page does not open, go to the Mail Settings tab in Mail, click the domain and check that a webmail application is selected in Webmail. To open webmail over HTTPS without a browser warning, select a valid certificate in SSL/TLS certificate for webmail in the same place.

Mail apps on phones and computers

Plesk supports automatic setup for some mail apps; entering your email address and password may be enough. This does not work with Outlook 2019 and Microsoft 365 (Outlook 365), or for domains without web hosting. If the settings are not found, you can enter them manually:

IMAP or POP3? With IMAP, messages stay on the server and look the same on all your devices; with POP3, messages are downloaded to your computer and removed from the server. If you use more than one device, we recommend IMAP. IMAP also lets you train the spam filter.

You can also see the correct values for your domain in Plesk: in Websites & Domains, open the domain's Mail Accounts and click the Mail Client Setup icon. If you cannot connect with these settings, you can open a support ticket.

The information in this guide is taken from Plesk's official documentation (docs.plesk.com, Plesk Obsidian customer guide).