SPF, DKIM and DMARC for Freshdesk

Short answer: Freshdesk mail passes Gmail, Yahoo and Microsoft checks when you turn on DKIM with your own domain, add include:email.freshdesk.com to your one SPF record and publish a DMARC record at _dmarc (start with p=none). The exact records and clicks are below.

SPF	TXT at `@`	v=spf1 include:email.freshdesk.com ~all Freshdesk's value is `include:email.freshdesk.com`. It costs several of SPF's 10 DNS lookups, so if your record is full use only your data centre's include: `fdspfus.freshemail.io` (US), `fdspfeuc.freshemail.io` (EU), `fdspfind.freshemail.io` (India) or `fdspfaus.freshemail.io` (Australia). Combine with your other senders →
DKIM	CNAME / TXT	Four CNAME records that Freshdesk generates for your domain (host names like `fwdkim1`, targets on `freshemail.io`).
DMARC	TXT at `_dmarc`	v=DMARC1; p=none; rua=mailto:dmarc@yourdomain.com Start with `p=none` and a mailbox you read, or a free report address that turns the reports into a dashboard; build your own.

Step by step

Add your support address on your own domain first; Freshdesk then lists the domain for DKIM.
Open Admin → Channels → Email → Advanced Settings → Configure DKIM and copy the four CNAME records.
Add them at your DNS host, then expand the domain in Freshdesk and click Verify. It can take up to 48 hours.
Add the SPF include to your one SPF record at @, and publish DMARC at _dmarc with p=none if you have none.

Mistakes that break it

GoDaddy and some other panels add the domain for you: enter only the host part (such as fwdkim1), or the name gets doubled and verification fails.
A space before or after a CNAME value is enough to make verification fail.
Using your own mail server (custom SMTP) in Freshdesk? Then that server signs and sends the mail, so set up SPF and DKIM for that provider instead.
On Cloudflare, keep the CNAMEs DNS only, not proxied.

Check that it worked

After the fix, keep an eye on it: free DMARC monitoring shows every service that sends mail as your domain and which ones fail, in plain English.

Rather not touch DNS? I set up SPF, DKIM and DMARC without breaking your other senders, with a before/after report.

Get it fixed on Fiverr

Prefer to do it yourself? Get the step-by-step Fix Kit ($15) – 19-page guide, checklist, 20+ providers.

Other setup guides

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