How to Create an Email Alias on Your Own Domain (and When You Need a Mailbox Instead)

An email alias is an extra address that delivers into a mailbox you already have, so sales@yourbusiness.com can land in your own inbox without a new account. To create one, open your email provider's admin, pick the person's mailbox and add the part before the @. You need a real mailbox instead when someone must send as that address, read it separately, or share it.

Below: what an alias does and doesn't do, how to add one in LotsMail, Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 and Zoho Mail (each from the provider's own help page, opened on 31 October 2026), and a plain way to choose between an alias, a shared mailbox, a group address and a catch-all.

Alias, mailbox, shared mailbox, group: which one do you need?

The short rule: an alias is a second door into the same room. Whoever can open the mailbox can read everything that arrives through every door.

What an alias does, and what it doesn't

An alias:

• Receives mail. Anything sent to the alias lands in the mailbox it belongs to.
• Costs nothing extra on the big providers. Google says up to 30 aliases per user "at no extra cost", and Microsoft says up to 400 aliases per user with no additional fees or licences (both checked on 31 October 2026).
• Needs no new DNS records once your domain is connected. The records belong to the domain, not to each address.

An alias doesn't:

• Give anyone a separate inbox. Mail to sales@ and mail to you@ sit together.
• Give anyone a separate login or separate permissions. Access belongs to the mailbox.
• Always let you reply as the alias. This one differs by provider, so it is covered per provider below.

How to create an email alias in LotsMail

LotsMail is business email on your own domain, priced per domain. Aliases are called extra addresses in the console.

1. Connect your domain first. If you haven't, follow how to get custom domain email. Adding an address needs a verified domain.
2. In the console, open Mailboxes and choose the mailbox that should receive the mail.
3. Open the Addresses tab. It reads "Mail to any of these arrives in this mailbox" and lists the main address and any extra ones.
4. Choose + Add another address, type the part before the @ (for example sales), and press Add. The console confirms "Address added."
5. Send a test message to the new address from another account and check that it arrives in the mailbox.

A few rules worth knowing:

• Workspace owners and admins can add and remove extra addresses, and so can a mailbox's managers.
• An address can only exist once on a domain. If sales@ is already a mailbox, a group or an extra address, LotsMail tells you it is already in use.
• To remove one, open the same tab and choose Remove. Mail sent to it afterwards goes to Unrouted, or to your catch-all if you have one. Mail already received stays in the mailbox. The main address can't be removed.
• LotsMail tells the people who use a mailbox when addresses on it change, and those notices can't be switched off.
• Adding addresses doesn't add to your bill. LotsMail is priced per domain: Starter is $5 a month or $50 a year for one domain, with mailboxes and people included. The pricing page says unlimited is subject to fair use (checked on 31 October 2026, lotsmail.to/pricing).

Sending as an alias. In LotsMail, mail you send from a mailbox leaves from that mailbox's main address, and an extra address receives mail only. If you need to send as sales@, make sales@ a mailbox of its own, as described below.

Turn an alias into a mailbox when you need to send as it

If sales@ is an extra address today and you now need replies to come from sales@:

1. Open the mailbox it belongs to, Addresses tab, and remove sales@.
2. In Mailboxes, choose + New mailbox, type sales as the address, pick Shared if several people will answer it (or Personal for one person), and press Create mailbox.
3. In the new mailbox's Who can read this tab, give the people who answer it access.

Do it in one sitting. Between steps 1 and 2, mail sent to sales@ goes to Unrouted. The console says it keeps unrouted mail for 7 days, and you can deliver each message to a mailbox from the Domains page, so nothing needs to be lost. Mail already received stays in the old mailbox.

When you need a mailbox instead of an alias

Choose a mailbox when any of these is true:

• You send as that address. Invoices from billing@, quotes from sales@, replies from support@.
• Different people should read it. Everyone who can open a mailbox reads the mail that arrives through every one of its addresses. Access is per mailbox: for each person you choose whether they can read, read and send, or have full control, in the mailbox's Who can read this tab.
• Several people answer it. A shared mailbox keeps one copy of each message in one place, so two people don't answer the same customer. I compared it with group email in shared inbox vs group email.
• An AI agent should see that address and nothing else. Permissions for agents are set per mailbox (read, draft, send), and sending by agents is off until you turn it on. An alias shares its mailbox's permissions, so give the agent its own mailbox. Restricted mailboxes go further and limit who a mailbox can receive from and send to.
• The address should outlive a person. A shared mailbox stays when someone leaves; you remove their access and the history stays.

If a mailbox would have cost you a seat, this is where per-person pricing pushes people into aliases they then outgrow. At LotsMail's price per domain, a second mailbox doesn't change the bill, so you can decide on what the address needs.

When a group address or a catch-all is the better tool

A group address is for reaching several people at once. In Groups in the console, choose an address such as team@ or sales@, name the group and tick who is in it. Each person gets their own copy in their own inbox. By default only people in your workspace can email a group; mail from outside waits in Unrouted until you deliver it, unless you turn on "Accept mail from outside senders" for that group. Groups are included on every plan. If you use an AI agent with LotsMail, owners' and admins' agents can create and change groups too.

A catch-all sends mail for any address on your domain that doesn't exist to one mailbox you choose. In LotsMail it is under Domains, in the domain's More settings, and it is off by default: unknown addresses go to Unrouted. A catch-all means you never miss mail to an address you forgot to create, and it also means every guessed or misspelt address reaches a real inbox, so it fits a small domain better than a busy one.

How Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 and Zoho Mail do aliases

All three charge nothing extra for the alias itself. What differs is how many you get and whether you can reply as one. Everything here is from each provider's own help page, opened on 31 October 2026.

Two things to know about the big providers:

• Each person is a paid seat. Google lists Business Starter at $7.00 per user per month on its pricing page (checked on 31 October 2026; the page also shows an introductory discount for new customers). Microsoft's alias page says its Manage username and email option doesn't appear for a person without a licence assigned. Zoho's pricing page shows no price in the Mail Lite box today. So a mailbox for a role address is a seat on a per-person plan, and an alias is the free way to add one. That is the right choice when you only need to receive.
• Google and Microsoft both point you to something other than an alias when several people need the same address. Google recommends delegation, and Microsoft says to create a shared mailbox.

I compared the two suites with LotsMail on price in LotsMail vs Google Workspace and LotsMail vs Microsoft 365.

For agencies: aliases for each client

Each client gets its own workspace with its own domains and mailboxes, so the steps above are the same inside each client's workspace. Your agency team role never opens a client's mail: a mailbox opens only when someone is given access. For the client addresses people write to, such as projects@ or support@, use a shared mailbox rather than an alias on one person. More in business email for agencies.

Check your addresses with your AI agent

Connect Claude, ChatGPT or any MCP client and your agent can read the mailboxes you allow, one at a time. It can't add or remove addresses: that is a console task for owners, admins and mailbox managers. Once the addresses exist, you can ask:

In LotsMail, list my mailboxes. In the info@ mailbox, find the threads from the last week that were sent to sales@ and tell me which still need an answer. Don't send anything.

Setup is on the connect page, and the full guide is connect ChatGPT or Claude to your business email.

Try it

Start free on lotsmail.to: free credits when you sign up, no card, enough to run one domain for about a month. Connect your domain, create the mailbox, add the extra addresses.

FAQ

What is an email alias?

An email alias is an extra address that delivers into a mailbox that already exists. Mail sent to sales@yourbusiness.com lands in the same inbox as mail sent to you@yourbusiness.com. It has no inbox, login or permissions of its own.

Does an email alias cost extra?

Not on the big providers: Google allows up to 30 aliases per user at no extra cost, and Microsoft up to 400 with no additional fees or licences (checked on 31 October 2026). In LotsMail, adding an extra address doesn't change your bill, because LotsMail is priced per domain, not per person.

Can I send email from an alias?

It depends on the provider. In Google Workspace the user sets a custom From address in Gmail. In Microsoft 365, Outlook on the web can reply from the alias the mail came to, and an admin setting adds a From choice. In LotsMail, mail leaves from a mailbox's main address, so create a mailbox for any address you need to send as.

What is the difference between an alias and a group address?

An alias points one address at one mailbox. A group address copies each message into the inbox of every member. Use an alias to give one person a second address, and a group for team@ or sales@ when several people should each get the mail.

Should I use an alias or a shared mailbox for support@?

A shared mailbox, if people answer it. Everyone with access sees the same threads and replies go out from support@. An alias on one person's mailbox leaves that person as the only one who can read and answer it.

Do I need new DNS records for an alias?

No. The records belong to your domain, not to each address. Once the domain is connected, you add the address in your provider's admin.

Sources

• LotsMail: pricing, home FAQ, llms.txt, tool list, changelog (mailbox privacy notices, delete a mailbox, group addresses), all opened on 31 October 2026
• Google: Add or delete an alternate email address (email alias), Google Workspace pricing, opened 31 October 2026
• Microsoft: Add another email alias for a user, opened 31 October 2026
• Zoho: Can I configure more than one email address for a single user?, Zoho Mail pricing, opened 31 October 2026