MX Record Lookup

What Are MX Records?

MX (Mail Exchange) records are DNS records that specify which mail servers are responsible for accepting email on behalf of a domain. When you send an email to [email protected], the sending mail server queries the DNS for example.com's MX records to find out where to deliver the message.

Each MX record has a priority value (also called preference). Lower numbers mean higher priority — the sending server tries the lowest priority value first. If that server is unavailable, it tries the next highest priority. This allows for mail server redundancy and failover.

How to Read MX Record Results

• Priority — Lower number = higher priority (0 is highest, 100 is lowest).
• Mail Server — The hostname of the server that handles incoming email for the domain.
• TTL — Time To Live in seconds. How long DNS resolvers cache this record.

Common MX Record Providers