Forgot to add mx lines to DNS, is there anywhere my emails would be caught? (CentOS)

Question

I set up a server on digitalocean, but forgot to add the MX records to the dns.

Is there anywhere the emails sent to my domain would end up? Any way to recover them?

Answer 1

If the domain has any A records, the messages will be sent there. If there is an A record but there is no listener on port 25 on the identified hosts, then sending MTAs will buffer them locally for a short while and retry periodically. If you set up MX records (or SMTP servers on the A-record hosts) quickly enough, the retries will get to you.

But if the domain has no A, MX, or AAAA records, the messages will have failed completely and may have bounced back to their senders.