Why are Google Domains shutting down?

In what is surely the most surprising news to come out of Google's recent earnings call, the company has officially announced that they are shutting down their own product - a direct contradiction of what were told by Google in early March. Why did they do this? It looks like there is a major problem with the structure of Google Domains, which has made it unprofitable and so Google has had no choice but to kill it off. How do you stop losing your domain name? Firstly, your domain name is a valuable asset - it could be one of the most valuable assets that you own. It is your online identity, your brand, your customer service platform. If you are hosting any kind of a business online, you are probably using some form of a website or eCommerce platform. In that case, you need a reliable domain name, which you can manage directly from your Google Domains account, without having to call up your registrar every time you have a problem.

The problem is that there isn't always an easy way to manage all of these separate pieces. In the past, it was possible to put them all together into one 'central management' product from a single source, but the old platform is being phased out. This means that you will soon have to split your domains into two sets of management products: one for your DNS and another for your content.

Now, you can expect to lose your domain name if you host more than one domain in one Google Account, or if you want to try something completely different (eg move away from web hosting). If you find that you're struggling with this, there are still solutions available. Most of the big names in the hosting industry offer some sort of a managed hosting service, which will take care of these tasks for you, but you will need to decide for yourself which one will work best for you.

Google Domains Shutting Down - What will you do? Once Google has decided to discontinue the function of the old domain name management service, it is likely that they will continue to sell the domain name management, but under a different name. How will this affect you? If you currently have a hosting service that requires you to use Google Domains to manage your website's DNS, you should be able to keep using it until you find a replacement.

How do I find MX records in Google Domains?

Answer.

Answer: Go to this Google Domains page and click on the FindMX Records button. Can I add to or remove an MX record? Answer: Yes. You can add or remove MX records at any time, as long as you are adding an A record for that domain, not an MX record.

If I added a wrong MX record, what will happen? Answer: When you make changes to your DNS settings for your domain, your MX records will be automatically updated. You can view this in your Google Domains control panel, under the Manage Record Set area of the Domain Summary page.

How do I know if my MX records are working? Answer: In order for your mailserver to receive mail for your domain, it must be configured as the mail server for your domain, using the MX record in the NS records for your domain. To make sure your mailserver is configured properly, verify the IP addresses of the webmail boxes for your domain. These should be the same address that you put into your MX records.

I have changed my DNS and want to confirm I have updated it correctly. Answer: Use this tool to confirm that you've changed the correct records for your domain. Why do I need two MX records? Answer: To use Google Domains for your domain, you must have an A record pointing to Google's IP address, and at least one MX record pointing to your mailserver. What does MX mean? Answer: MX is short for mail exchanger. This name is used by SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) to describe a mail exchanger, or a mail system where a mailserver communicates with other mail servers to deliver messages.

Can I send email from Gmail to my mailserver? Answer: Yes, but you have to tell Gmail which mailserver to send email to. The steps to accomplish this depend on how you have your mailserver configured. Most modern mailservers now have this option. It is called "reverse lookup" in Gmail.

Answer: A hostname must resolve to an IP address for MX records to work. The MX records for the domain must be configured correctly in the DNS, and the mailserver must be listening on that IP address.

How do I make sure my MX records are working?