Ask HN: Is it possible to run your own mail server for personal use?

Sure! I run several servers (and developing them, see https://poste.io). Watch DMARC reports and give it little time, most of time it will solve itself. You can also register to feedback loop...

Was a mail admin for quite a number of years, here is some tips. Check that the ip address you are running your own mail server from is not black listed. Nor can the IP hosting the mail server be in a home ip range. This is because there is spam black lists that explicitly mark home user ip ranges as possibly spammy.

Check the repuation in the various anti spam blacklists out there * Check IP in multiple blacklist http://multirbl.valli.org/ * Check server IP on mxtoolbox http://mxtoolbox.com/whatismyip/ * If you are using home server IP please consider using a VPS with a good IP reputation. * Consider lookup up ip at Cisco senderbase reputation and check its score, make sure its consider good. https://www.senderbase.org * Lookup ip in Barracuda repuation http://www.barracudacentral.org/lookups (Cisco and Barracuda is because these are somewhat common antispam services at edges).

Absolutely possible but its a battlefield on the Internet so you have to understand the players. Two things I haven't seen mentioned in all the excellent advice:

1) Does your ISP let you send email? Some ISP's will not allow any outbound traffic to port 25 from a non "business" port. They force their users to send their email to their server, and then they forward it on to the Internet.

They do this with nominally good intentions (it is easier to control spam generated from their networks), but they also are financially motivated to do so.

2) Don't try to send mail from a dynamic IP address, you should have (and would probably pay extra for) a fixed static IP address (V4 and V6).

Dynamic IPs have two problems, one they change and mail receivers don't like that. Two, they carry with them the abuses people who had the IP address before committed. So your email may get delivered one day, and then poof you renew the lease on your IP and get one that is on a black list somewhere.

Ars did a series of articles on running your own mail server: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2014/02/how-to...

I've given up on it for transactional email for any of my small-time SaaS services. Coaxing gmail into accepting my emails was a constant fight. Just when I thought I was good, they'd start blocking me again for some new obscure reason.

I remember fondly the days you could send an email to postmaster@domain.com and get a response from a real human being and at least attempt to have a rational conversation to resolve your mail delivery issues. I've tried that with google, yahoo, et al. and have never received a response.

I just use mailgun/mandrill/etc. these days and forget about it. I also pay $10 a year to a provider for my personal email address.