Create a Route 53 Hosted Zone

ServerlessInbox needs a Route 53 hosted zone for your domain before you deploy — the CloudFormation stack writes DNS records into it for mail routing, domain verification, and certificate validation.

Create the hosted zone

1. Open the AWS console and go to Route 53 → Hosted zones.
2. Choose Create hosted zone.
3. Enter your domain name (for example, example.com).
4. Leave the type as Public hosted zone.
5. Choose Create hosted zone.

Note the Hosted zone ID shown on the zone’s detail page — you’ll need it for the hostedZoneId parameter when you install ServerlessInbox Standard.

Point your domain at the hosted zone

• If your domain is registered directly with Route 53, the hosted zone is created automatically when you register the domain, and its nameservers are already in place. You don’t need to do anything further.
• If your domain is registered with a different registrar, Route 53 generates a new set of NS (nameserver) records for the hosted zone you just created. Copy those NS records from the hosted zone’s detail page and update your domain’s nameserver settings at your registrar to point to them. This step is required for DNS validation and mail routing to work — without it, the hosted zone exists but your domain won’t actually use it.

The hosted zone must exist (and, if applicable, have its nameservers updated) before you launch the ServerlessInbox stack.