Sending domains
Send patient email from your own domain instead of the shared SmileLine one.
By the end of this page your practice's email will leave from your own domain, with your name in the sender line and your own sending reputation behind it.
Why connect a domain
Out of the box, patient email sends from a shared SmileLine domain. That works, and it is well maintained — but every practice on the platform shares its reputation, and patients see a sender they do not recognise.
Connecting your own domain changes both: the sender line carries your practice, and inbox providers build a reputation for you alone.
Nothing stops while you set this up. Until a domain is verified, email sends exactly as it does today — from the shared SmileLine domain. A domain that is pending, or one that never verifies, cannot break your sending.
Queued delivery
Email sent through Smileline, including automation messages and Inbox replies, uses a delivery queue. A busy email provider delays delivery; rate limits are retried automatically. This also applies when you use your own sending domain. Connecting another domain does not create a separate sending allowance.
Which domain to use
Most practices connect a subdomain — mail.yourpractice.co.uk rather than yourpractice.co.uk. A subdomain keeps the records we ask for entirely separate from the mail you already run on your main domain (Google Workspace, Microsoft 365), so there is nothing to break there.
You need access to your domain's DNS to finish: your registrar, Cloudflare, or whoever built your website.
You can connect up to five domains.
Connect and verify
Add the domain
Open Settings → Sending domains and click Add domain. Enter the domain and confirm.
The card appears as Setting up while we register it with our email provider. That takes a few seconds — the page refreshes itself, so there is nothing to click.
Publish the DNS records
Once the card reads Waiting on DNS it lists the records to publish — typically a DKIM signature, an SPF entry and a return-path record.
If we can tell who manages your DNS, the card says so as soon as the records appear, and offers to do the work for you once the domain is registered. On Cloudflare it also links straight to your DNS records page. Whichever route you take, the records are always listed below.
Copy each Name and Value into your DNS host exactly as shown, or use Copy all to take the whole set at once. Do not reformat, shorten or add quotes to the values.
Below the required records you will find a recommended DMARC record. It is optional and we never check it. Starting at p=none only asks inbox providers for reports; it changes nothing about delivery.
Wait for verification
We check with our email provider a couple of minutes after the domain is registered or its records are published, again over the next quarter of an hour, then hourly. Most DNS hosts publish within minutes; some take up to a day. The page refreshes while it waits, and the card turns Verified by itself.
Check now reads the provider's current verdict straight away. If the records are in place the card turns Verified on the spot; if they are still missing, it asks the provider for a fresh check.
Point your From address at it
Nothing else to do: once the domain verifies, the built-in email connection sends from it automatically, as hello@ your domain.
To use a different address, open Settings → Channels, click Edit on the email connection and type the part before the @ of the From address, such as reception. The domain after it is one of your verified sending domains — pick it from the list when you have more than one.
Let us add the records for you
This only works when Cloudflare manages your DNS. Every other host needs the copy-and-paste route above — that is not a limitation of your setup, it is what those hosts allow.
The card names your DNS host whenever it can work it out, and offers whichever route is open to you.
Set up with Cloudflare
Takes you to Cloudflare, where you sign in, see exactly what will be added, and approve it there. Nothing is changed until you approve it.
Approving may tidy an existing SPF record on the send subdomain so both senders keep working — Cloudflare shows you that before you confirm.
Coming back, the card goes to Setting up and then Waiting on DNS. We confirm by reading your DNS ourselves, not by taking anyone's word for it, so the card only turns Verified once the records really resolve.
Add the records for me
Where the one-click route is not available, you can create a token in Cloudflare and paste it in.
That token lets us change the DNS records for the domain you pick, so keep it to the one domain. We use it only for this setup — finding your zone, checking what is already there, adding the records and confirming they landed — and then discard it. We never save it and it never appears in our logs. You can delete it in Cloudflare afterwards; nothing here stops working.
We only ever add records to empty names. Anything already published is left exactly as it is and reported back to you, so an existing DMARC policy or another sender's record is never overwritten.
Send the records to someone else
The person setting this up is often not the person with the DNS login — it is frequently the agency that built the website.
Email these records to your DNS manager opens a message in your own email app, already written, with the records in it. It comes from you, so whoever receives it knows who is asking.
What each status means
| Status | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Setting up | We are registering the domain with our email provider. | Nothing — it settles on its own. |
| Waiting on DNS | Registered. We are watching for your records. | Publish the records shown on the card, then click Check now if you do not want to wait. |
| Verified | Your records are in place and your domain is in use. | Leave the records published — we re-check weekly. |
| Records not found | Your DNS host does not have the records, or they do not match. | Fix the records, then click Check again. |
| Needs attention | Something needs a person. The card says what. | Follow the card, or contact support. |
| Removing… | The domain is on its way back to our email provider. | Nothing, unless the card offers Retry removal. |
Keep the records published
A verified domain is re-checked every week. If the records are removed or changed, the domain drops out of use and email falls back to the shared SmileLine domain — mail keeps going out, but your branding does not. The card tells you when this happens.
Do not delete the records after verification, and let whoever manages your DNS know they are in use.
Remove a domain
Click Remove on the card and confirm. Email goes back to the shared SmileLine domain straight away; we hand the domain back to our email provider in the background.
The card stays on the page while that finishes, so a removal that gets stuck stays visible rather than disappearing. If it does stick, Retry removal picks it up again.
Owners and managers can add, check and remove sending domains. Front desk and telesales see the page read-only.