DMARC Record Reference

This article serves as a reference for the formal structure, tags, and key technical details of a DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance) record.

DMARC record format

A DMARC record is a special type of TXT record published at the _dmarc subdomain. The record’s format and tags are specified in RFC 7489.

The value of the TXT record is a single string containing a series of semicolon-separated tags, where each tag is a key/value pair. All DMARC records must begin with the v tag.

Canonical representation:

_dmarc.example.com. IN TXT "v=DMARC1; p=reject; rua=mailto:dmarc@example.com"

In the DNSimple record editor, a DMARC record is represented by the following customizable elements:

Element Description
Name The host name for the record, which must be _dmarc.
TTL The time-to-live in seconds.
Content A single string of semicolon-separated DMARC tags.

DMARC tags and their values

Tag Description Value
v Version: Must be the first tag in the record. DMARC1
p Policy: The policy for the organizational domain. none (monitor only), quarantine (treat as suspicious), reject (block message).
pct Percentage: The percentage of messages to which the DMARC policy applies. A number from 0 to 100.
rua Reporting URI for aggregate reports: An email address to which aggregate reports are sent. mailto:address@example.com
ruf Reporting URI for failure reports: An email address to which forensic reports are sent. mailto:address@example.com
adkim DKIM alignment mode r (relaxed), s (strict)
aspf SPF alignment mode r (relaxed), s (strict)
fo Forensic options: Controls when forensic reports are generated. 0 (all failures), 1 (any failure), d (DKIM failure), s (SPF failure)
sp Subdomain policy: The policy to apply to subdomains. none, quarantine, reject
ri Report interval: The interval in seconds between aggregate reports. A number representing seconds. The default is 86400 (1 day).
rf Report format: The format for failure reports. afrf (Authentication Failure Reporting Format)
rfmt Reporting format afrf (Authentication Failure Reporting Format)
fo Forensic reporting mode b0, 1, d, s

Have more questions?

If you have additional questions or need any assistance with your DMARC records, just contact support, and we’ll be happy to help.