Bring your own email provider to WorkOS

Email is a critical part of authentication flows, whether it’s sending magic links, verification codes, or onboarding invitations. But for many enterprises, relying on a shared email service creates challenges: poor deliverability, lack of visibility into what happens after messages are sent, and compliance requirements that demand control over domains and reputation.

Starting today, WorkOS customers can configure custom email providers, such as Amazon SES, Postmark, Resend, or SendGrid, directly in the WorkOS Dashboard. This new feature gives you the best of both worlds: the control and observability of using your own provider, combined with the simplicity of WorkOS-authored authentication flows.

Why we built this

Until now, developers had two choices:

• Use WorkOS’s default email provider. Simple and fully managed, but opaque; no visibility into delivery or bounce status, and emails were sent from shared domains that often landed in spam.
• Build a webhook-based email system. Highly customizable, but required reliable infrastructure, email templates, and ongoing monitoring.

Custom email providers strike the balance: you bring your own ESP credentials, and WorkOS takes care of delivering transactional emails. You get control over deliverability, reputation, and compliance, while still offloading the heavy lifting of email handling.

Why it matters

• Deliverability & trust. Messages sent from your own domain are far less likely to land in spam, improving conversion and sign-up rates.
• Observability. No more guessing whether a code arrived: delivery, bounce, and failure events are available directly in the Dashboard.
• Compliance. Many enterprises require using their own email infrastructure for audit and security reasons. WorkOS now makes this possible without sacrificing developer experience.

How it works

We are adding support for Amazon SES, Postmark, Resend, and SendGrid.

To configure a custom email provider, navigate to WorkOS dashboard > Emails > Providers.

Choose your provider from the presets and click Enable.

Enter the required information per provider:

• For Resend or SendGrid, the API Key.
• For Amazon SES, the Access Key ID, the Secret Access Key, and the Region.
• For Postmark, the Server API Token, and the Account API Token.

All credentials are stored with WorkOS Vault encryption, and only one provider is active at a time to reduce misconfiguration risks.

For all providers, you will also have to configure:

• From: The default from address. Domains will be verified with the provider.
• Reply to: Optional. Default reply-to address.

When the configuration is done, send a test email to validate setup.

Once configured, all transactional emails (including magic codes, sign-in links, and Admin Portal invitations) will be sent via your provider, using your verified domains.

Check email delivery status

A new Email > Events tab shows delivery status for every message (delivered, failed, delayed, queued), available for both custom and WorkOS-managed providers.

Example: Configuring Resend as your email provider

Let’s walk through configuring Resend as your custom email provider in WorkOS.

Step 1: Generate an API key in Resend

1. Log in to your Resend Dashboard.
2. Navigate to API Keys and create a new key with sending permissions.
3. Copy the key; you’ll paste it into WorkOS.

Step 2: Verify your sending domain

1. In Resend, add and verify your domain (via DNS records).
2. Once verified, you can send from any address on that domain.

Step 3: Configure Resend in WorkOS

1. Go to WorkOS dashboard > Emails > Providers.
2. Choose Resend from the provider list and click Enable.
3. Paste your API key and set the From Address to match your verified domain.

Step 4: Send a test email

1. Use the built-in “Send test email” button to confirm the configuration.
2. Check your inbox to ensure delivery works as expected.

Getting started

Check out the Custom Email Providers documentation to configure your first provider today. If you’re already using WorkOS, you can try it right from your Dashboard.

WorkOS makes it easy to bring enterprise-grade infrastructure to your app. Now, with the support of custom email providers, you can bring your email too.