Cloudflare Requirements

SDP Email needs somewhere to publish your email DNS records. A domain registered with us uses our nameservers, so the records are created for you and Cloudflare is not needed. Every other domain must be on Cloudflare, as described below.

Domains Registered With Us

If you registered the domain through us and it still uses our nameservers, skip this page: activation publishes the records directly, with no Cloudflare login. If you moved the domain to other nameservers, the Cloudflare requirements apply.

Domain Must Be In Cloudflare

Before activating a domain, the domain must:

Be added to Cloudflare.
Have an active Cloudflare zone.
Match the exact domain shown in SDP Email.
Be accessible to the Cloudflare account you connect during activation.

If example.com is shown in SDP Email, the connected Cloudflare account must contain an active example.com zone.

Why Cloudflare Is Required For Other Domains

SDP Email uses Cloudflare to automate email DNS:

Publish MX records for inbound delivery.
Publish DKIM, SPF, and MAIL FROM records for outbound sending.

Cloudflare Authorization

When you click an activation button, SDP Email redirects you to Cloudflare OAuth. After approval, Cloudflare redirects back to SDP Email and the setup continues automatically.

The authorization requests zone read and DNS write access only. The authorization state expires after a short period. If the flow expires or fails, return to the domain details page and start activation again.

Existing MX Records

Receiving activation needs control of the domain's MX records. If the domain already has MX records pointing elsewhere, SDP Email will warn you before continuing so you can confirm the change.