How Do I Improve My MXRight Score?
Within Pitchbox, all active email accounts are automatically monitored by MXRight, to give you up-to-date and accurate information about your email accounts health and deliverability.
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What is an MX Score?
Your MX Score for each email account is located within the Deliverability Center. You can manually run a check on your active email accounts at any time.
Email accounts with a score of B and higher are generally considered in good health. However, we would recommend trying to get your MX Score as high as possible to ensure the best performance from your email accounts.
Understanding the MXRight Report
MXRight generate a comprehensive email health report, providing detailed insights into your account's deliverability performance. We recommend sharing these findings with your IT team for further review.
There are various areas of your email accounts health analyzed when generating an MX Report:
DNS
DNS (Domain Name System) records match easy-to-remember website names (like example.com) to their online IP addresses. While DNS records are commonly associated with websites, they're equally crucial for email marketing, preventing spoofing and boosting deliverability.
You can update your DNS record from inside your email server settings. You can add a new record, edit an existing record, or delete an old record.
SMTP
SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) is the outgoing mail server that delivers your emails to recipients. The HELO/EHLO SMTP commands initiate mail transfer by authenticating the sending server to the recipient server, establishing the foundation for secure email delivery. The RCPT TO command is used to specify the recipient of an email message during the SMTP message transfer.
SPAM
Your sender reputation will determine whether your emails land in the Inbox or Spam folder. You can check the Reputation Dashboard to ensure that your email domain has a good reputation.
The same applies for your domains IP address.
DKIM
DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail) is an email authentication method that uses encrypted signatures to verify you as the legitimate sender of a message. It prevents unauthorized use of your domain or identity, protecting against impersonation attempts targeting you or your organization.
SpamAssassin
SpamAssassin is a widely-used open-source spam filter that evaluates emails and assigns a spam score based on over 700 tests. Lower scores (ideally negative or 0–2) improve deliverability, while scores above 5 risk being flagged as spam. Administrators can set custom thresholds (often 3–5), so aiming for the lowest possible score ensures better inbox placement. Negative scores indicate high legitimacy, while positive values signal potential spam triggers.
How do I improve my MX Score?
To ensure optimal email deliverability, we recommend routinely monitoring your MX Score. If the report identifies issues (such as misconfigured records, missing reverse DNS, or improper authentication), take immediate action to resolve them:
- Update DNS Records – Correct any invalid or missing MX, SPF, DKIM, or DMARC records directly in your email server or DNS management console.
- Delist from Blacklists – If your domain or IP appears on spam lists (e.g., Spamhaus, Barracuda), submit removal requests to the respective blacklist operators.
- Evaluate Free Email Domains – For free providers (e.g., Gmail, Yahoo), some reputation issues may be irreversible; creating a new account may be more efficient than repairing a compromised one.
- Monitor Consistently – Even after fixes, recheck your MX Score periodically to prevent recurring issues.
Proactive maintenance reduces bounce rates and safeguards your sender reputation.