Does MX Records have anything to do with outbound email?

I'm really confused about the MX Records and generally with email. I've set up Haraka SMTP server for outbound email delivery because I need to send sign up validation emails.

If I don't want to receive emails just to send them, do I need to setup MX records for my email server?

Solution 1:

You are not required to have MX records just to send email.

However:

• you must use a valid, existing and working email domain as sender address in all outgoing traffic (sending mail from [email protected] is not allowed)
• any domain used in email traffic can work without MX records if it has a valid A record, but this kind of setup is not much used on the 'net nor really encouraged. If a domain must be able to receive mail, set up valid MX records.
• any domain used in email traffic (such as the sender address of the previous items) must have a valid and working postmaster@ account, that means the domain must be able to receive mail, that means the domain should have MX records

Short story: you don't have to have/manage MX records, but be sure to use a working email address as sender and be sure it is on a working domain with valid MX records.

Solution 2:

No, MX records are not used when sending outbound mail.

However, some mail servers may require that the domain of the from address have the necessary DNS records to support incoming mail, in which case you need either an MX or A record on that domain.

Solution 3:

Just to send email you do not have to establish MX records for your own domain.