Postfix mail for domain.com loops back to myself Error and Solution

Posted on in Categories , , , , , , , , last updated June 2, 2009

I can send and receive mail using user@example.com, but system generated emails such as root@mail.example.com bounce backup with an error:

May 1 03:14:52 mail postfix/smtp[62798]: 23CA4BD6B40: to=, relay=none, delay=0.01, delays=0/0/0/0, dsn=5.4.6, status=bounced (mail for mail.example.com loops back to myself)

How do I fix this error?

Postfix did found a dns reply to your email server, but it hasn’t been configured to deal with address such as root@mail.example.com. In other words, your server is configured to accept user@example.com but not as user@mail.example.com. This is well known config problem with virtual domain. To fix this error either add system FQDN to mydestination or relay_domains. Postfix accepts mail for domain listed in virtual_mailbox_domains, virtual_alias_domains, and domains that resolve to IP addresses listed in inet_interfaces and proxy_interfaces. Update mydestination using postconf or by editing main.cf file:

mydestination = localhost.$mydomain, localhost, mail.example.com

Once done reload postfix:
# service postfix reload

Posted by: Vivek Gite

The author is the creator of nixCraft and a seasoned sysadmin, DevOps engineer, and a trainer for the Linux operating system/Unix shell scripting. Get the latest tutorials on SysAdmin, Linux/Unix and open source topics via RSS/XML feed or weekly email newsletter.

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9 comment

  1. I’ve done it but does not works for me, this is what i got:
    at /etc/postfix/main.cf
    myhostname = example.tdl
    myorigin = /etc/mailname
    mydestination = example.tdl, localhost, localhost.localdomain

    at /etc/mailname
    example.tdl

    at /etc/hostname
    example.tdl

  2. another cause is when you have too mail servers with same hostname
    it happened for me
    watch out for “greeted me with my own hostname”
    @Andrés Chandía
    i don’t think that is a FQDN
    I proper FQDN is “myhost.mydomain.com.”
    or even “myhost.mysubdomain.mydomain.com.”
    though it depends if the trailing dot is inluded or not
    the important thing is that if you do a ping or nslookup
    you get your host (the mail server)
    from anywhere in the interenet (the FQDN must be unique)

  4. Fixed it finally, added in the following:

    mydestination = $myhostname, localhost.$mydomain, localhost, $mydomain

    added $mydomain and it worked perfectly!
    thanks!

  6. sorry to nudge and old post, just wanted to drop a line, for webmin what worked for me was:
    What domain to use in outbound mail – use hostname
    Internet hostname of this mail system – myactualdomain.tld
    Local internet domain name – myactualdomain.tld

    in the config file it looks something like this:
    mydomain = myactualdomain.tld
    myhostname = myactualdomain.tld

    hope this helps, worked out for me on EC2

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