Help & Troubleshooting
TXT Record
What this is
TXT records hold free-form text and are the workhorse for domain verification (Google, Microsoft, SaaS tools) and email policies (SPF lives in a TXT record). A domain typically accumulates several TXT records over time.
How to read your result
You will usually see a mix: an SPF record (starts with v=spf1), verification tokens (google-site-verification=…), and service-specific entries. Review whether every entry is still needed — stale tokens are clutter but harmless; duplicate SPF records are actively harmful.
Common problems and how to fix them
Two or more SPF records exist
How it shows up: Email authentication starts failing intermittently — receivers treat multiple v=spf1 records as a permanent error.
How to fix it: Merge them into ONE record combining all mechanisms, e.g. "v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com include:mailer.example.net ~all". Never add a second v=spf1 record when a new tool asks for SPF — extend the existing one.
Verification token was added but the service still cannot verify
How it shows up: Search Console or a SaaS tool keeps saying verification failed even though you added the TXT record.
How to fix it: Check the record was added at the right name (bare domain vs subdomain), wait out the TTL, and confirm the value was pasted without surrounding quotes being doubled. Run a TXT look up to see exactly what is being served publicly.
A TXT value longer than 255 characters was entered as a single string
How it shows up: Some DNS providers reject the record; others truncate it, breaking whatever consumes the record.
How to fix it: Split values over 255 characters into multiple quoted strings within one record ("part1" "part2") — consumers concatenate them. Most provider UIs do this automatically, but verify with a look up.