Send email through your own mail server (SMTP)

By default, Polzy sends email from its own shared account. Connect your own mail server over SMTP and every email this workspace sends to participants — campaign invitations and reminders, thank-you and event emails, workflow emails and replies in a conversation — goes out through it, from your own mailbox. It works with any server that accepts a username and password: Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, your hosting provider's or your own.

SMTP only sends: your server says it accepted a message and nothing after it, so Polzy cannot show whether an email was delivered, opened or bounced, and cannot receive replies through it. If you need those, use Resend, SendGrid or Mailgun instead.

Before you start

You need:

• A workspace on Team or higher, and the Admin role in it.
• Your server's SMTP details: host name, port and whether it uses SSL/TLS.
• A mailbox, or a user, that is allowed to send through it, with its username and password.
• The address to send from, which that user is allowed to send as.

Polzy signs in with a username and password. A server that only accepts other kinds of sign-in, or only accepts mail from known IP addresses, cannot be used.

How Polzy uses your server

• All participant email. Once you choose your server for email, every email the workspace sends to participants goes through it. Polzy's own email — sign-in links, password resets, invoices — still comes from Polzy.
• Who it is from. The From Email you enter. The name set under Settings → Branding (Sender name) takes precedence over the From Name entered here. Emails carry no separate reply-to address, so replies go to the From Email.
• What it looks like. Nothing changes: emails keep your workspace's logo and colour.
• What it costs. Your mail provider's limits and prices apply. These emails do not count against your organization's monthly emails in Polzy.

Step 1: Get your server's details

The details for the two most common providers:

Microsoft 365. Authenticated SMTP is off for most mailboxes. An admin turns it on in the Microsoft 365 admin center under Users → Active users: select the mailbox, then Mail, Manage email apps, and tick Authenticated SMTP. It does not work while security defaults are on, or where a policy blocks basic authentication for SMTP. See Microsoft: Enable or disable SMTP AUTH in Exchange Online.

Google. With 2-Step Verification on, sign in with an app password rather than the account's own password. Google limits this to 2,000 messages a day per user. See Google: Send email from a printer, scanner, or app.

For any other server, ask its provider for the host, the port and the user to send with. Port 587 with Use SSL/TLS off starts unencrypted and then switches to TLS; port 465 needs Use SSL/TLS on.

Step 2: Connect your server in Polzy

1. Open the place to connect it:
   • On Team: Messages, then the Integrations tab. Under Providers, find Custom SMTP and click Set up.
   • On Business and up: Integrations in the sidebar, the Available tab, then Connect on Custom SMTP's row.
2. In the Connect Custom SMTP panel, fill in the fields:

1. Click Test connection. Polzy connects and signs in without sending anything. You should see Successfully connected to SMTP server with the host and port.
2. Click Connect.

Integration

Connect Custom SMTPKeys are encrypted and only used on your behalf.

5 of 5 required

Credentials

SMTP HostRequired

SMTP PortRequired

Use SSL/TLSEnable for port 465 (SSL), disable for port 587 (TLS)

UsernameRequired

PasswordRequired

From EmailRequired

From NameOptional

Encrypted at restTest connectionConnect

Step 3: Choose your server for email

Connecting it does not switch your email over yet. Choose it once for the workspace:

1. Open Settings, then the Notifications tab, and scroll to Channels.
2. On the Email row, change Polzy · shared account to Custom SMTP.
3. Make sure the switch on the row is on.

Channels

Channels appear here once a provider is connected under Connect. Until then, Polzy sends on its own shared account with a lower daily cap.

EmailOnInvitations, reminders and conversation replies. · 1,240 sent · 30dCustom SMTP

SMSOffShort invitations for people without a desk. · not sendingPolzy · shared account

WhatsAppOffTwo-way messages through a Business number. · not sendingPolzy · shared account

SlackOffChannel posts and direct messages to admins. · not sendingNo provider connected

TeamsOnPosts into a Teams channel your workspace watches. · not sendingNo provider connected

From now on every email the workspace sends goes through your server.

Test it

Send a small campaign with only yourself in the audience (see Send a survey with a campaign). In Messages, the email shows Sent once your server accepts it, and stays there: SMTP reports nothing after that. Check that it arrived, and open its details in your mail app to see that SPF, DKIM and DMARC say pass for your domain.

Troubleshooting

Good to know

• No delivery statuses, no replies. The connector's page says so under Receiving and Good to know: SMTP confirms only that the server accepted a message.
• Conversations. A reply to a conversation email goes to the From Email mailbox under the person's own address — for an anonymous follow-up too, so whoever reads that mailbox sees who wrote. If your workspace uses conversations, Resend or Polzy's shared account keeps replies inside Polzy.
• Reply-to address. The Reply-to address under Settings → Branding is not used with SMTP.
• If your server stops accepting mail, Polzy keeps trying it and marks it Needs attention. If you disconnect it, or your plan no longer includes your own email sender, email goes back to Polzy's shared account and counts against your monthly emails again.
• What Polzy keeps. The password is stored encrypted and never shown again.

Useful links

• Microsoft: Enable or disable SMTP AUTH in Exchange Online
• Google: Send email from a printer, scanner, or app