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Free Microsoft 365 Email at Your Charity’s Domain

An email address at your own domain (you@yourcharity.org instead of a personal Gmail) is the single biggest credibility upgrade a small nonprofit can make — donors, grantmakers, and platforms like Google and Candid all treat it as a trust signal. Microsoft grants qualified nonprofits Microsoft 365 Business Basic for free (up to 300 users), and Free For Charity helps you claim it. This is the most common thing charities ask us for, so here is the whole path.

Step 1 — Check eligibility

Microsoft’s nonprofit grant covers 501(c)(3) organizations (and equivalents). You’ll need your EIN and legal organization details. If you’re pre-501c3, start with our Pre-501c3 onboarding — you can still get a domain and prepare everything else while your determination is pending.

Step 2 — Have a domain ready

Your email lives at your domain, so the domain comes first. FFC buys and manages .org domains for supported charities at no cost — see choosing your .org domainif you don’t have one yet.

Step 3 — Register with Microsoft for Nonprofits

  1. Go to microsoft.com/nonprofits and select Register now.
  2. Provide your organization details (legal name exactly as on your IRS letter, EIN, address, and your new domain-based contact if you have one).
  3. Microsoft validates your nonprofit status through its verification partner — this usually takes from a few hours to a few business days.
  4. Once approved, activate the Microsoft 365 Business Basic (Nonprofit) grant licenses in the Microsoft 365 admin center.

Step 4 — Connect your domain (DNS)

Microsoft asks you to prove you own your domain and then add a handful of DNS records (MX, CNAME, TXT for SPF). This is the step FFC does for you.Our volunteers manage supported charities’ DNS in Cloudflare, so when the admin center shows you the records:

  • Send us the verification code / record values Microsoft displays.
  • We add them, usually the same day.
  • You click Verify, and mail starts flowing to Microsoft.

If you manage your own DNS, add each record exactly as shown and allow up to an hour for propagation before verifying.

Step 5 — Create mailboxes and turn on MFA

  • Create a mailbox per person, plus shared addresses like info@ and donations@(shared mailboxes are free and don’t use a license).
  • Turn on multi-factor authentication for every account before you do anything else — nonprofit accounts are heavily targeted by fraudsters. Our security guide covers this in five minutes.

Common problems

  • Verification rejected:the legal name or EIN didn’t match IRS records. Re-submit with the name exactly as it appears on your determination letter.
  • Mail not arriving:MX record missing or still pointing at the old provider. Contact us — it’s a two-minute DNS fix.
  • “Domain already in use”: someone previously created a Microsoft tenant with your domain. Microsoft support can release it; we can help you request that.

What this unlocks next

With domain email in place you can claim Google for Nonprofits (Ad Grants), register for a Candid Seal of Transparency, and accept fee-free online donations — each one asks for an email at your domain.

Stuck at any step? Contact us — helping charities through exactly this is what our volunteers do.