Is Hostinger your DNS host?
If the domain's nameservers end in dns-parking.com — ns1.dns-parking.com and ns2.dns-parking.com for most domains — Hostinger manages its records. A domain bought at Hostinger starts that way. If the nameservers name another company — ns.cloudflare.com, vercel-dns.com — hPanel still shows the zone and its records, and none of them are published; that host's guide is the one to follow.
Where the records go
- Sign in to hPanel at hostinger.com and open Domains.
- Choose Manage beside the domain, then DNS / Nameservers in its menu.
- The form for a new record sits above the list of existing ones. Choose the Type, and fill in the fields beside it.
A domain attached to a Hostinger website has the same zone under Websites, the site's Advanced menu, DNS Zone Editor. Either way in edits the one zone.
What Hostinger calls each field
Hostinger names the value field after the record type, so the form for each of the three types used here looks different. It is one field.
| On imado | On Hostinger | What to put |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Type | Choose it first: the fields beside it change with the type. |
| Host | Name | Only the part before your domain — Hostinger adds .example.com itself. For the MX record it is @, which means the domain itself. |
| Value | TXT value / Target / Mail server | One field under three names: TXT value on a TXT record, Target on a CNAME, Mail server on the MX. Exactly as shown, without quotes. |
| Priority | Priority | On the MX record, after Mail server. 10. |
| — | TTL | Leave it at Hostinger's default. |
What to put for the domain itself
One record — the MX record, the one that makes mail arrive — belongs to the domain itself rather than to anything in front of it. Every DNS panel has its own way of saying that, and instructions written for a different one are the usual reason a correct-looking MX record receives nothing.
On Hostinger, type @. Hostinger's own guides for MX and TXT records on the root domain use @ in Name. A guide written for a panel that wants the field left blank will tell you to leave it empty; on Hostinger, fill it in with @.
Do not type the domain in full. Hostinger's Name is the host without the domain name — it appends the domain itself — so the answer it wants is the short one.
The other five records all have something in front of the domain — _imado-challenge, _dmarc, the three _domainkey names — and those go in Name exactly as shown, with no domain after them.
Add the six records
First the ownership record; then, once imado shows it as Added, the other five. Each is the type, the fields, and the button that adds it.
| Type | Name | TXT value / Target / Mail server | Priority |
|---|---|---|---|
| TXT | _imado-challenge | imado-verification=… | — |
| CNAME | …._domainkey | ….dkim.amazonses.com | — |
| CNAME | …._domainkey | ….dkim.amazonses.com | — |
| CNAME | …._domainkey | ….dkim.amazonses.com | — |
| MX | @ | inbound-smtp.us-east-1.amazonaws.com | 10 |
| TXT | _dmarc | v=DMARC1; p=none; | — |
What gets in the way
- Hostinger's own MX records. A domain on Hostinger's nameservers starts with two MX records for Hostinger's mail:
mx1.hostinger.comat priority 5 andmx2.hostinger.comat priority 10. A lower number wins, so the first outranks imado's, and mail keeps going to Hostinger however right imado's record is. Hostinger's own advice when changing mail provider is to delete the existing MX records first; delete both. The same goes for any MX record Hostinger Email added if you used it on this domain. - Hostinger Email putting its records back. If a Hostinger Email plan is still attached to the domain, it can set its own MX, SPF and DMARC records again. Remove the domain from the plan, or cancel it, before you rely on imado's.
- Reset DNS Records. The button at the foot of the zone puts every record back to Hostinger's defaults — its MX records included — and removes imado's. If mail stops arriving at imado, check whether it was pressed.
- A DMARC record already there. If the zone has a TXT record on
_dmarcfrom Hostinger Email, delete it and add imado's: a domain publishes one DMARC policy.
Then, on imado
Back on your domain's page, press Check again. A new record is usually seen within the hour; a record you correct rather than add can take longer, because Hostinger's default TTL keeps the old answer for up to four hours. When the ownership record is Added, the other records appear; when those are, create the mailbox and send yourself a message — steps 5 and 6 of the setup.
Hostinger's own guides cover MX records, TXT records and resetting the zone.
