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Google Workspace email and a new website

SiteSmith · · 5 min read

If your business email runs on Google Workspace, getting a new website does not mean touching your email at all. Gmail on your domain depends on its MX record and a few text records; the website depends on the records for the bare domain and www. Change only the website's records, leave Google's in place, and your inbox carries on as before. The extra things to check with Google are an old Google Sites page that may be holding your domain, and a verification record that people sometimes delete by mistake.

What Google needs to keep working

Open the place where your domain's DNS is managed (often your registrar, sometimes a web host or Cloudflare) and look for these. They are Google's, and they stay:

  • MX records. Newer Workspace accounts use a single MX record, smtp.google.com, with priority 1. Accounts set up before 2023 usually have five: ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM plus ALT1 to ALT4. Both setups work. Do not "clean up" the five old ones unless you replace them with the new single record.
  • SPF. A TXT record on the bare domain containing include:_spf.google.com.
  • DKIM. A TXT record named google._domainkey with a long value. If it is missing, your mail still flows but is more likely to be filtered. You can create it in the Google Admin console under Apps, Google Workspace, Gmail, Authenticate email.
  • Verification. A TXT record starting with google-site-verification=. It proves to Google you own the domain. Deleting it can trigger warnings in the Admin console later.
  • DMARC, if someone added one: a TXT record at _dmarc.
  • Custom shortcuts, such as a CNAME called mail pointing to ghs.googlehosted.com, which lets mail.yourdomain.com open Gmail. Handy, harmless, keep it.

What the new website will change

A new website usually needs two records changed, and nothing else:

  1. The A record for the bare domain (shown as @), which points to the new website's server.
  2. The www record, usually a CNAME, which points www.yourdomain.com to the same place.

That is the whole job from the website's side. If whoever builds your new site asks for more, ask what each extra change is for. Keeping your domain where it is and pointing it at a new site explains this route in full.

Google-specific traps

An old Google Sites page or a Google Domains leftover

Some businesses made their first website with Google Sites, or bought the domain through Google Domains, which Google sold to Squarespace in 2023. In both cases there may be records you did not add yourself:

  • A Google Sites custom address. If www pointed to ghs.googlehosted.com for a Sites page, that record is the old website and does need to change. Also remove the custom address inside Google Sites so the old page does not keep claiming it.
  • A domain now at Squarespace. If your domain moved from Google Domains to Squarespace, your DNS records moved with it, including Google Workspace's. Sign in at Squarespace's domain page to manage them. The email stays with Google; only the place you edit DNS changed. What happened to Google Domains covers this in more detail.

Billing tied to a domain you no longer recognize

If Workspace was originally bought along with the domain, the Workspace bill may have moved too, to Squarespace or another reseller. Before the website project, sign into the Google Admin console and check Billing so you know who charges you and when. A missed Workspace renewal turns off email, and it has nothing to do with the website.

Switching nameservers to a new website company

If the new website's company suggests moving your nameservers to them, the list of records you see today gets replaced by theirs. Copy every Google record into the new list before you switch. Then, in the Google Admin console under Account, Domains, Manage domains, check the status of your domain. Google shows a warning if MX or verification records are missing.

A sensible order on switch day

  1. Check that the new website looks right on its preview address, on a phone and a computer.
  2. Screenshot your DNS list.
  3. Change the A record for the bare domain and the www record. Leave everything else.
  4. Within an hour, send a message to your business address from a non-Google account, such as a Yahoo or Outlook.com address, and check it arrives in Gmail.
  5. Reply to it and check the reply lands in the inbox, not spam.
  6. Fill in the new website's contact form and check where the enquiry arrives.
  7. Look at the Google Admin console's domain status for warnings.

If an enquiry form on the new site sends mail on your behalf, its sending service should be added to your SPF record and, ideally, set up with its own DKIM signature. Otherwise form enquiries may get treated as suspicious by Gmail, even though they arrive in your own inbox. SPF, DKIM and DMARC for small business owners explains how to add a sender.

When you also want to leave Google

Some owners combine a new website with a move away from Google Workspace, or onto it from an old host's email. Do these as two separate projects. Move the email first, let it run for a week, then switch the website. Doing both together makes it hard to tell which change caused a problem, and email problems are the ones that cost customers.

Your checklist

  • Find where your DNS is managed and log in.
  • List Google's records: MX, SPF, DKIM, verification, DMARC and any mail shortcuts.
  • Check the Admin console's billing and domain status.
  • Remove any old Google Sites custom address if Sites was the old website.
  • Change only the bare domain and www records for the new site.
  • Test mail in and out, and test the website form.

If your Workspace email works well and only the website needs replacing, you can see your site rebuilt first on a preview address, then make the two-record change when you are happy with it.

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