--- title: "SPF Fail – Get To Know Why Your Email Delivery Failure Occurs For Your Domain | DuoCircle" description: "Join the thousands of organizations that use DuoCircle Find out how affordable it is for your organization today and be pleasantly surprised.Interested in" image: "https://www.duocircle.com/images/og-default.png" canonical: "https://www.duocircle.com/content/spf-permerror/spf-fail/" --- Content # SPF Fail – Get To Know Why Your Email Delivery Failure Occurs For Your Domain Join the thousands of organizations that use DuoCircle Find out how affordable it is for your organization today and be pleasantly surprised.Interested in [ Talk to an Expert → ](/contact/) [ See what we make ](/products/) ## SPF Fail – Get To Know Why Your Email Delivery Failure Occurs For Your Domain [Fix Your SPF Errors Now](/email/spf-record-check) _Emails are amongst the fastest modes of communication_. However, you may sometimes encounter technical reasons such as an **SPF fail mechanism**, and the emails can remain undelivered. Let us understand what the SPF fail mechanism is. ![spf permerror](https://media.mailhop.org/duocircle/images/2020/12/spf-query.png) ### Variations Of SPF Fail Errors When you analyze your domain’s [DMARC and SPF](https://www.csoonline.com/article/3254234/mastering-email-security-with-dmarc-spf-and-dkim.html) records, you can encounter several outcomes. Here is an elaboration of what these outcomes could mean. **SPF records** contain various mechanisms. These mechanisms can come prefixed with one of the following qualifiers. “+” “Pass” “-” “Fail.” “\~” “Softfail.” “?” “Neutral” These qualifiers can instruct a policy to apply to the IP addresses in each mechanism. Here is what each of these qualifiers denotes. - **SPF Pass** – An SPF record designates the host to be allowed to send the email. - **SPF Neutral** – The analyzer evaluates the mechanisms in order. If no modifier or mechanism matches, the default result is [SPF neutral](/content/spf-permerror/spf-neutral). - **SPF Softfail** – Under such circumstances, the SPF record designates the host as not allowed to send but is in transition. - **SPF Fail** – This record designates the host as NOT being allowed to send. - **SPF none** – Such a qualifier usually denotes that the domain does not have an SPF record. - **SPF Permerror** – A poorly formatted SPF record is a prime example of [SPF permerror](/content/spf-permerror), which denotes a permanent error. - **SPF Temperror** – A temporary error can occur when there is a _temporary issue while retrieving specific DNS records_. It produces an [SPF temperror](/content/spf-permerror/spf-temperror). ### What Is SPF Permerror Office 365? You often encounter an [SPF permerror Office 365](/content/spf-permerror/spf-permerror-office-365) message when you use MS Office 365 to send or receive emails. It occurs when _there is a syntax or format error in the SPF record_. Therefore, you should ensure to set up the SPF record correctly. It should not have any additional spaces or unrecognizable characters in the [DNS TXT record](https://www.namecheap.com/support/knowledgebase/article.aspx/317/2237/how-do-i-add-txtspfdkimdmarc-records-for-my-domain). The **SPF fail error** can be annoying to a business entity as it does not allow it to send or receive emails on behalf of its domain. _Rectifying the error is of paramount importance as email undoubtedly forms the backbone of communication_ for any thriving business. ![spf records](https://media.mailhop.org/duocircle/images/2020/12/view-spf-record.png) ##### Join the thousands of organizations that use DuoCircle --- Find out how affordable it is for your organization today and be pleasantly surprised. [Auto SPF - Sign Up FREE](/email/spf-record-check)Interested in our Partner Program for MSPs and VARs? Visit Our [MSP Partner Program](/msp-partner-program). ## Ready to talk? Same-day response from someone technical. We tell you yes or no quickly. If yes, we get to work. [Talk to an Expert→](/contact/)[See what we make](/products/) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Organization","name":"DuoCircle LLC","url":"https://www.duocircle.com","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://www.duocircle.com/images/duocircle-logo.png"},"description":"DuoCircle is a portfolio of specialized email products covering protection, authentication, delivery, and routing. We deliver about 90% of category-leader capability at roughly half the price, backed by experts who own the outcome. Trusted by 50,000+ organizations since 2014.","subOrganization":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138898167","name":"DMARC Report","url":"https://dmarcreport.com"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138897474","name":"AutoSPF","url":"https://autospf.com"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138897912","name":"Phish Protection","url":"https://www.phishprotection.com"}],"sameAs":["https://www.linkedin.com/company/duocircle","https://x.com/duocirclellc","https://www.facebook.com/duocirclellc","https://www.g2.com/products/phish-protection-by-duocircle/reviews","https://github.com/duocircle","https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/duocircle-llc"],"contactPoint":{"@type":"ContactPoint","contactType":"customer support","url":"https://support.duocircle.com"},"knowsAbout":["Email Security","Email Authentication","SPF","DKIM","DMARC","Phishing Protection","Spam Filtering","SMTP Relay","Email Deliverability","Email Forwarding"]} ``` ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"WebSite","name":"DuoCircle LLC","url":"https://www.duocircle.com","description":"DuoCircle is a portfolio of specialized email products covering protection, authentication, delivery, and routing. We deliver about 90% of category-leader capability at roughly half the price, backed by experts who own the outcome. Trusted by 50,000+ organizations since 2014.","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"DuoCircle LLC","url":"https://www.duocircle.com","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://www.duocircle.com/images/duocircle-logo.png"},"description":"DuoCircle is a portfolio of specialized email products covering protection, authentication, delivery, and routing. We deliver about 90% of category-leader capability at roughly half the price, backed by experts who own the outcome. Trusted by 50,000+ organizations since 2014.","subOrganization":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138898167","name":"DMARC Report","url":"https://dmarcreport.com"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138897474","name":"AutoSPF","url":"https://autospf.com"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q138897912","name":"Phish Protection","url":"https://www.phishprotection.com"}]}} ``` ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"WebPage","name":"SPF Fail – Get To Know Why Your Email Delivery Failure Occurs For Your Domain","description":"Join the thousands of organizations that use DuoCircle Find out how affordable it is for your organization today and be pleasantly surprised.Interested in ","url":"https://www.duocircle.com/content/spf-permerror/spf-fail/","speakable":{"@type":"SpeakableSpecification","cssSelector":[".page-answer",".duo-rich-text p:first-of-type"]},"dateModified":"2023-07-21T18:19:27.000Z","datePublished":"2020-12-08T17:41:21.000Z"},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"DuoCircle","item":"https://www.duocircle.com/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"SPF Fail – Get To Know Why Your Email Delivery Failure Occurs For Your Domain","item":"https://www.duocircle.com/content/spf-permerror/spf-fail/"}]}] ```