Free business email in Zambia: set up name@yourbusiness.co.zm

Most Zambian businesses get a PACRA certificate, a ZRA TPIN and a bank account in the first month and then run everything from a Gmail address for years. The address is the part a mining procurement officer in Kitwe, a Lusaka tender committee or a foreign buyer sees first. Moving it to sales@yourbusiness.co.zm costs a yearly domain fee in kwacha, the mailboxes can be free, and nothing has to be paid with a dollar card.

Quick answer

Register yourbusiness.co.zm at a ZICTA-accredited registrar, paying by mobile money or bank transfer. Create a free OquMail workspace with no card, add the domain, paste four DNS records at the registrar, click Verify and create your mailboxes. Then add the mailbox to the Gmail app on your phone over IMAP so you can answer from anywhere, including during load shedding on mobile data.

Choosing your domain: .co.zm or .com

Zambia's country domains are administered by ZICTA, the Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority, and sold through accredited registrars, most of them local ISPs and hosting companies that bill in kwacha. The .co.zm ending is the standard for Zambian companies and the one local buyers recognise.

• .co.zm: the default for Zambian businesses; priced in kwacha, no dollar card needed
• .org.zm, .ac.zm, .gov.zm: for organisations, universities and government; not for a trading company
• .com: fine if most of your customers are abroad; Zambian buyers trust it too, but .co.zm signals a locally registered business
• If the registrar bundles hosting and mailboxes, you can take the domain alone; the email does not need to live with them

Why a domain address matters in Zambia

Zambia runs on tenders and supply chains. ZPPA-regulated procurement, mining contractors on the Copperbelt, and the agribusiness buyers who deal with hundreds of small suppliers all vet vendors by their paperwork, and the email address is part of that paperwork. A quotation from accounts@yourbusiness.co.zm that matches the name on the PACRA certificate and the TPIN gets processed; one from a Gmail address gets a phone call asking whether the company is real. For tour operators in Livingstone and consultants working with NGOs, foreign clients are even stricter, and many simply do not reply to free webmail addresses.

Step by step: from domain to working inbox

1. Register yourbusiness.co.zm at a ZICTA-accredited registrar. Pay by MTN MoMo, Airtel Money, Zamtel Kwacha or bank transfer; the domain is usually live the same day.
2. Go to oqumail.com and create a free workspace with your name and a password. No card, no trial countdown.
3. In the dashboard choose Add domain and type yourbusiness.co.zm. OquMail shows the four DNS records to add.
4. Log in to your registrar, open DNS Management or the Zone Editor, and paste the MX, SPF, DKIM and DMARC records exactly as shown.
5. Return to OquMail and click Verify. The live DNS check tells you which record is still missing.
6. Create your mailboxes: info@, sales@, accounts@ and one per person. The free plan allows up to 15 mailboxes with 5 GB each.
7. Open webmail, send a test to your Gmail, then add the account to the Gmail app or Outlook on your phone with the settings below.

The four DNS records OquMail needs

Most Zambian registrar panels are cPanel-based, so the records go under Zone Editor. Delete any MX records (the settings that tell the internet where to deliver email for your domain) the registrar pre-set for its own mailboxes; keep only mail.oqumail.com, otherwise incoming mail splits between two servers and some of it is lost.

• MX — host @, value mail.oqumail.com, priority 10
• SPF (TXT at @) — v=spf1 MX (Mail Exchanger — where incoming email is delivered) a:mail.oqumail.com ~all
• DKIM (TXT at your selector ._domainkey) — v=DKIM1; k=rsa; p=… (the exact key is shown in your OquMail dashboard)
• DMARC (TXT at _dmarc) — v=DMARC1; p=none; rua=mailto:dmarc@yourdomain.com

OquMail connection settings

• Incoming (IMAP): mail.oqumail.com, port 993, SSL/TLS
• Outgoing (SMTP): mail.oqumail.com, port 587, STARTTLS
• Username: your full email address (you@yourdomain.com)
• Password: the same password you use for OquMail webmail

What it costs

The domain is a yearly fee in kwacha at the registrar. The email is free: OquMail's free plan has no card step and includes 15 mailboxes, 3 domains, 5 GB per mailbox, webmail, IMAP and SMTP for any mail app, delivery logs and a send API. That matters here because a Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 subscription needs a card that works internationally, and when the card fails the team loses access to its mail. A plan that never charges a card cannot fail that way.

Pitfalls common in Zambia

• Bundled hosting mailboxes with no DKIM. Mail from a new .co.zm domain already gets extra scrutiny at Gmail and Outlook; without DKIM and DMARC it lands in spam.
• Choosing SSL on port 587 in the mail app. It must be STARTTLS.
• MTN, Airtel and Zamtel mobile data block outbound port 25. Port 587 works on all of them; never configure a mail app on 25.
• Load shedding. Set the phone mail app to sync over mobile data as well as Wi-Fi, so replies go out when the office power is off.
• Leaving the Gmail address on the Facebook page, the signboard and the PACRA-facing letterhead after the domain is live.
• Letting the domain lapse. Set auto-renew and keep a reminder; a lapsed .co.zm can be registered by someone else.

Common questions

Do I need a PACRA certificate to register .co.zm?

Registrars may ask for the business name or certificate when you register a .co.zm, so have the PACRA details to hand. Register the domain in the exact name on the certificate so the email, the bank account and the quotations all match.

Can I use it with the Gmail app on my phone?

Yes. Add an account in the Gmail app, choose Other, and enter the IMAP and SMTP settings above with your full address as the username. The same mailbox then stays in sync on the phone, in webmail and in Outlook on a laptop.

What are the limits?

15 mailboxes, 3 domains, 5 GB per mailbox, no expiry. Extra mailboxes are added on request without touching DNS or existing accounts.

Want to see how your own domain is set up? Use the free SPF checker, DMARC checker and MX lookup: they run in your browser and store nothing.