Setting Up Email Forwarders in cPanel

This article explains how to forward email from a cPanel-hosted address to another mailbox. You can forward a single email account to one or more destinations, or forward every address on an entire domain to corresponding addresses on a different domain.

About email forwarders

A forwarder is a rule that tells cPanel to redirect incoming mail for an address to another email address. Forwarding works for both internal mailboxes, other cPanel accounts on your hosting plan, and external addresses, such as Gmail, Outlook, or any other provider, as long as the destination address is active.

cPanel supports two types of forwarders:

• Email account forwarder. Redirects mail from one specific address to one or more destinations.
• Email domain forwarder. Redirects every address on one domain to the matching address on another domain, for example, john@example.com to john@example.net.

Before you begin

• cPanel login credentials. You need access through the Exact Hosting portal or your domain's /cpanel URL.
• The source and destination addresses. Confirm the exact email address you want to forward from, and the active address you want to forward to.
• Active destination mailboxes. Forwarders fail silently if the destination address is closed or rejects mail.

Accessing Forwarders

1. Log in to cPanel through the Exact Hosting portal or by going to yourdomain.tld/cpanel.
2. In the cPanel home screen, locate the Email section.
3. Click Forwarders. The main Forwarders page lists every email account forwarder and email domain forwarder on your account.

Forwarding a single email account

Step 1: Start a new account forwarder

1. On the Forwarders page, use the Managing dropdown to select the domain that owns the address you want to forward.
2. Click Add Forwarder.

Step 2: Configure the forwarder

1. In the Address to Forward field, type the local part of the source address, everything before the @.
2. Choose Forward to Email Address and enter the full destination address.
3. Optionally, expand Advanced Options to discard mail, send a failure message back to the sender, or pipe mail to a program.

Step 3: Save the forwarder

Click Add Forwarder. Mail sent to the source address will now be delivered to the destination immediately.

Forwarding an entire domain

A domain forwarder redirects every mailbox on one domain to the matching mailbox on another domain in a single rule. For example, a forwarder from example.com to example.net sends mail addressed to john@example.com on to john@example.net.

Warning: Domain forwarders apply to every address on the source domain. Set one up only when you want every mailbox redirected — this affects all users at once.

Step 1: Start a new domain forwarder

1. On the Forwarders page, select the source domain from the Managing dropdown.
2. Click Add Domain Forwarder.

Step 2: Configure the domain forwarder

1. In the first field, confirm the domain you want to forward from.
2. In the Forward to field, enter the destination domain.

Step 3: Save the domain forwarder

Click Add Domain Forwarder. cPanel applies the forwarding rule immediately.

Deleting a forwarder

1. On the main Forwarders page, locate the email account forwarder or email domain forwarder you want to remove.
2. Click Delete next to that forwarder.
3. In the confirmation dialog, click Delete Forwarder or Delete Domain Forwarder to confirm.

Next steps

• Test the forwarder. Send a message to the source address from an external account and confirm it arrives at the destination.
• Combine with an autoresponder. Set up an autoresponder on the source mailbox to acknowledge incoming mail while forwarding continues in the background.
• Review your spam filtering. Forwarded mail can sometimes trigger spam filters at the destination. Configure SpamAssassin on the source mailbox to reduce noise.

Questions? Contact Exact Hosting Support.