···2525 * [Creating an account using pdsadmin](#creating-an-account-using-pdsadmin)
2626 * [Creating an account using an invite code](#creating-an-account-using-an-invite-code)
2727 * [Using the Bluesky app with your PDS](#using-the-bluesky-app-with-your-pds)
2828+ * [Setting up SMTP](#setting-up-smtp)
2829 * [Updating your PDS](#updating-your-pds)
29303031<!-- tocstop -->
···1992001. Enter the URL of your PDS (e.g. `https://example.com/`)
200201201202_Note: because the subdomain TLS certificate is created on-demand, it may take 10-30s for your handle to be accessible. If you aren't seeing your first post/profile, wait 30s and try to make another post._
203203+204204+### Setting up SMTP
205205+206206+To be able to verify users' email addresses and send other emails, you need to set up an SMTP server.
207207+208208+One way to do this is to use an email service. [Resend](https://resend.com/) and [SendGrid](https://sendgrid.com/) are two popular choices.
209209+210210+Create an account and API key on an email service and set these variables in `/pds/pds.env` (example with Resend):
211211+212212+```
213213+PDS_EMAIL_SMTP_URL=smtps://resend:<your api key here>@smtp.resend.com:465/
214214+PDS_EMAIL_FROM_ADDRESS=admin@your.domain
215215+```
216216+217217+_Note: Your PDS will need to be restarted with those variables. This varies a bit depending on your setup. You might need to just restart the server or recreate the container, depending on what you are using._
202218203219### Updating your PDS
204220