Is Squarespace your DNS host?
If you bought the domain at Squarespace, or at Google Domains before Squarespace took those domains over, and have not changed its nameservers, yes. Squarespace's own nameservers end in one of googledomains.com, squarespacedns.com, systemdns.com or nsone.net; the domain's DNS page shows them under Domain Nameservers. If they have been changed to another company's — ns.cloudflare.com, vercel-dns.com — Squarespace says so itself: the records in its DNS settings no longer apply, and that host's guide is the one to follow.
Where the records go
- Sign in at account.squarespace.com and open Domains.
- Choose the domain, then DNS, then DNS Settings.
- Scroll to Custom Records and press Add record. Squarespace asks for your password, or your two-step code, before the form opens.
What Squarespace calls each field
Squarespace's own help pages call the value field Data on one page, Text on a TXT record and Mail Server on an MX record. It is one field, the last on the row.
| On imado | On Squarespace Domains | What to put |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Type | Choose it from the list: TXT, CNAME or MX. |
| Host | Name | Only the part before your domain — Squarespace adds .example.com itself. For the MX record it is @, which means the domain itself. |
| Value | Data | Exactly as shown, with no dot at the end — Squarespace will not save a value that ends in one. Its own help pages call this field Data, Text or Mail Server depending on the type; it is one field. |
| Priority | Priority | Used on the MX record only. 10. |
| — | TTL | Leave the default Squarespace offers. |
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 Squarespace, type @. Squarespace's own instructions for an MX or TXT record on the root domain say exactly that: it adds your domain to the Name field itself, and @ means the domain with nothing in front of it. A guide written for a panel that wants the field left blank will tell you to leave it empty; on Squarespace, fill it in with @.
Do not type the domain in full. Squarespace appends your domain to the name, 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 Add record, the fields, and Save.
| Type | Name | Data | 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
- Email forwarding. A forwarding rule on the domain — one you set up, or one restored after the move from Google Domains — adds Mailgun's MX records under an Email forwarding heading in the DNS settings, and Squarespace will not let you delete them while any rule exists. Squarespace also refuses MX records from two different mail services on one domain. Delete every forwarding rule first: the domain's Email page, Email Forwarding, the bin beside each rule. The records go with the last one, and the same addresses can be created on imado.
- MX records left from Google. A domain that came from Google Domains can still carry Google's MX records —
aspmx.l.google.comand its siblings, ormx1.mx.google.com— from a Google Workspace or forwarding setup that no longer exists. Delete every MX record on@that is not imado's. - A trailing dot. Squarespace refuses to save a value ending in
.. Other hosts' instructions sometimes writeinbound-smtp.us-east-1.amazonaws.com.with the dot; on Squarespace, leave it off, exactly as imado shows it. - A second DMARC record. Squarespace allows one DMARC record per domain, and it may have added its own when the domain was registered. Adding
_dmarcthen asks whether to Replace record — replace it, and imado's takes its place. - Signing in to Squarespace with an address on this domain. Squarespace warns about this itself: if the address you sign in with is on the domain whose MX records you are changing, change the account's address first, so its sign-in mail is not the thing that stops arriving.
Then, on imado
Back on your domain's page, press Check again. A new record is usually seen within the hour, though Squarespace's own guidance allows up to two days. 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.
Squarespace's own guides cover editing DNS records, the records email needs and the conflicts it refuses.
