icloud.com SPF record: costs 5 of your 10 DNS lookups

Evaluated from public DNS on 25 September 2026. Records change, so check it live before you rely on the number.

5 of 10 lookups

Adding include:icloud.com to an SPF record uses 5 of the ten DNS lookups a receiving server allows: one for the include itself, and 4 for what icloud.com's own record pulls in.

That is half the budget or more. If the vendor lets you send from a subdomain, give it its own record there and its lookups stop counting against your root domain. If it insists on your root domain, you can hand SPF Guru this include alone and leave the rest of your record as it is:

include:icloud.com._i.%{ir}.my.spf.guru

That costs one lookup whatever sits behind it. How offloading one vendor works.

The record, expanded

icloud.com
v=spf1 redirect=_spf.icloud.com
- redirect=_spf.icloud.com 4 lookups
  - _spf.icloud.com
    v=spf1 include:_nets2.icloud.com include:_nets1.icloud.com include:_nets0.icloud.com ~all
    - include:_nets2.icloud.com 1 lookup
      - _nets2.icloud.com
        v=spf1 ip4:57.103.64.0/18 ip6:2a01:b747:3000:200::/56 ip6:2a01:b747:3001:200::/56 ip6:2a01:b747:3002:200::/56 ip6:2a01:b747:3003:200::/56 ip6:2a01:b747:3004:200::/56 ip6:2a01:b747:3005:200::/56 ip6:2a01:b747:3006:200::/56 ip6:2a01:b747:3007::/56
        
        ip4:57.103.64.0/18
        
        ip6:2a01:b747:3000:200::/56
        
        ip6:2a01:b747:3001:200::/56
        
        ip6:2a01:b747:3002:200::/56
        
        ip6:2a01:b747:3003:200::/56
        
        ip6:2a01:b747:3004:200::/56
        
        ip6:2a01:b747:3005:200::/56
        
        ip6:2a01:b747:3006:200::/56
        
        ip6:2a01:b747:3007::/56
    - include:_nets1.icloud.com 1 lookup
      - _nets1.icloud.com
        v=spf1 ip4:144.178.36.0/24 ip4:144.178.38.0/24 ip4:112.19.199.64/29 ip4:112.19.242.64/29 ip4:222.73.195.64/29 ip4:157.255.1.64/29 ip4:106.39.212.64/29 ip4:123.126.78.64/29 ip4:183.240.219.64/29 ip4:39.156.163.64/29
        
        ip4:144.178.36.0/24
        
        ip4:144.178.38.0/24
        
        ip4:112.19.199.64/29
        
        ip4:112.19.242.64/29
        
        ip4:222.73.195.64/29
        
        ip4:157.255.1.64/29
        
        ip4:106.39.212.64/29
        
        ip4:123.126.78.64/29
        
        ip4:183.240.219.64/29
        
        ip4:39.156.163.64/29
    - include:_nets0.icloud.com 1 lookup
      - _nets0.icloud.com
        v=spf1 ip4:17.41.0.0/16 ip4:17.58.0.0/16 ip4:17.142.0.0/15 ip4:17.57.155.0/24 ip4:17.57.156.0/24
        
        ip4:17.41.0.0/16
        
        ip4:17.58.0.0/16
        
        ip4:17.142.0.0/15
        
        ip4:17.57.155.0/24
        
        ip4:17.57.156.0/24
    - ~all

Counts include everything nested beneath a branch, which is how the ten lookup limit is applied. To see what your own record costs with this include in it, check your domain.

See what the common email vendors cost, measured the same way.