SPF tools

SPF record checker

Prevent email delivery failures and spoofing risks by checking your SPF record for errors and misconfigurations in seconds.

Prevent delivery failures by validating SPF syntax, lookup limits, and terminal policy.

How to use the SPF checker

Enter your domain

Type example.com, we fetch the published SPF record from DNS in real time.

We validate everything

Syntax, duplicate records, the 10-DNS-lookup limit, terminal policy strength, and common misconfigurations.

Review issues by severity

Each finding is graded high, medium, or low, with a plain-English explanation of what to fix.

Understanding your results

Valid SPF

The record parses correctly, stays within the lookup limit, and ends with a sensible policy. You're good to send.

Needs attention

The record exists but has issues, too many lookups, a weak terminal policy, or deprecated mechanisms. Review the graded findings below the record.

No SPF record

No SPF is published, so any server can claim to send as your domain. Use the SPF Generator to build and publish one today.

Why SPF matters

Stops spoofing

SPF lets receiving servers verify that mail claiming to be from your domain comes from servers you authorized.

Protects deliverability

Gmail and Yahoo now require SPF or DKIM for all senders, and both for bulk senders. Missing SPF sends you to spam.

The 10-lookup limit

SPF evaluation stops after 10 DNS lookups and returns a permanent error. Too many includes silently break your authentication.

Works with DKIM & DMARC

SPF is one leg of email authentication. Pair it with DKIM signing and a DMARC policy for full protection.

Frequently asked questions

A TXT record starting with v=spf1 that lists every server authorized to send email for your domain, ending with a policy (like ~all or -all) for everything else.

SPF allows at most 10 DNS lookups per evaluation (includes, a, mx, exists, redirect all count). Past 10, receivers return a permerror and your SPF effectively fails. Flatten includes or remove unused vendors to get under the limit.

~all (softfail) asks receivers to accept but mark suspicious mail; -all (hardfail) asks them to reject it outright. Start with ~all, monitor with DMARC reports, then tighten to -all.

No, publishing more than one v=spf1 record is a permanent error and breaks authentication. Merge all mechanisms into a single record.

Try more email authentication tools

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Run this check once, or have it watched 24/7.

SenderSignal monitors these signals continuously: 48 blacklists, SPF, DKIM, DMARC, TLS and more, with alerts in Slack, email and signed webhooks.

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