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mail-in-a-box
mailinabox
Python2014–2025
mail-in-a-box / mailinabox

mailinabox

Mail-in-a-Box helps individuals take back control of their email by defining a one-click, easy-to-deploy SMTP+everything else server: a mail server in a box.

Systems & InfrastructureDevOps & CloudCommunication & Social
Explore on GitHubRead Hacker News discussions
31Distinct people
38Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
15.5KGitHub stars
REPOSITORY AT A GLANCE

What to know before exploring

What it is

Mail-in-a-Box helps individuals take back control of their email by defining a one-click, easy-to-deploy SMTP+everything else server: a mail server in a box.

GitHub

Where it is used

No documented product use was verified in the last source check.

What people are saying

No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.

No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.

Also in these discussions

Mentioned in the same Hacker News threads. That is not proof they are substitutes.

This week on Hacker News

Nov 7–Nov 14 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/14/2026, 5:04:57 PM UTC.

No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.

Mentions over time

HN mentions by year38 dated mentions

Observed mentions: 2014-04-23 15:22:16 UTC to 2025-01-27 04:18:20 UTC.

02462014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 6 mentions; 1 submissions, 5 comments20142015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 2 submissions, 0 comments2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 6 mentions; 2 submissions, 4 comments2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 6 mentions; 1 submissions, 5 comments2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 4 mentions; 0 submissions, 4 comments20192020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 1 submissions, 1 comments2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 4 mentions; 0 submissions, 4 comments2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 1 submissions, 0 comments2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 4 mentions; 0 submissions, 4 comments2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2025

Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.

View mention counts and date ranges
UTC ranges include their start and exclude their end. Select a period to filter the source evidence.
PeriodStart (UTC)End (exclusive, UTC)MentionsSubmissionsComments
20142014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC615
20152015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC220
20162016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC624
20172017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20182018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC615
20192019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC404
20202020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC211
20212021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202
20222022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC404
20232023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC110
20242024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC404
20252025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101

What Hacker News says

38 sources
nobody9999·Aug 16, 2024
Sorry for the late reply. I've heard good things about Mail-in-a-Box[0], but haven't used it myself (although I have/do use(d) a bunch of the servers/tools amalgamated into the product). The setup guide[1][2] also gives a good overview of implementation requirements. Have fun! [0] https://mailinabox.email/ [1] https://mailinabox.email/guide.html [2] Annoyingly, the setup guide wants to you 'curl setup.sh | bash'. You might want to check it out first at https://github.com/mail-in-a-box/mailinabox
In Tmpmail: Temporary email right from your terminal written in POSIX sh
hardwaresofton·Sep 5, 2022
My list[0] being discussed on HN as well[1]: - maddy (https://github.com/foxcpp/maddy) (this is my personal favorite, I'm running at least 6 instances right now) - chasquid (https://blitiri.com.ar/p/chasquid/) - mailu (https://github.com/Mailu/Mailu) - mailinabox (https://github.com/mail-in-a-box/mailinabox) - mailcow (https://github.com/mailcow/mailcow-dockerized) - docker-mailserver (https://github.com/docker-mailserver/docker-mailserver) - Postal (https://docs.postalserver.io/) (more for API driven email apps) - Haraka (https://haraka.github.io/) (SMTP only) - Combine with [WildDuck](https://wildduck.email/)? [0]: https://vadosware.io/post/its-never-been-easier-or-harder-to... [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32720234
In Email Done My Way, Part 0 – The Journey
hardwaresofton·Feb 22, 2022
I run my own mail servers for small projects, though for my main email I've actually switched to ProtonMail (previously dovecot + postfix). It's never been easier to self host your email with projects like the following around: - https://foxcpp.dev/maddy/ - https://github.com/albertito/chasquid - https://github.com/haraka/haraka - https://github.com/mail-in-a-box/mailinabox - https://github.com/Mailu/Mailu Of course the usual dovecot + postfix setup is great for learning even if a bit complicated.
In Running a private mail server for six years, easy peasy
mastazi·Jan 19, 2021
Regarding the VPS: It requires 512 MB RAM minimum, but 1 GB is recommended, that would be e.g. the $10/month Digitalocean VPS. MIAB will do automated backups of everything that's on the machine, this means that it will use more than double the space on disk (compared to just the space that it would be required to store your email + attachments), that's if you choose to store the backups on local disk (but why would you?). The alternatives are either not doing backups (bad!) or storing backups on a different machine using rsync, or on an S3 bucket. Personally I use DigitalOcean Spaces which is S3 compatible, and I store backups from the last 3 days. The Spaces bucket was an additional $5 in my Digitalocean bill. So you should consider the backup storage cost as well. Regarding webmail: MIAB includes Roundcube by default, which is OK on des
Read the rest
ktop but basically unusable on mobile, so on mobile I just use the built in client that came with my iPhone. Of course you can use whatever webmail client you prefer, you just install it on a different VPS though (because MIAB will pretty much take over the whole VPS for itself; the only thing you can have alongside it on the same VPS, is a purely static website). MIAB also includes Nextcloud [ * ] where you can add an alternative webmail client [1]. In order to install that client you need to unlock the nextcloud admin by executing a script that is included in MIAB [2]. [*](in MIAB, Nextcloud is intended to manage calendar+contacts but you can also use it to store files or as an additional webmail client, even though those two use cases are not officially supported by the MIAB devs; this means that, if you have an issue related to storage or webmail, you should seek help from the Nextcloud community, not from the MIAB forums). [1] https://apps.nextcloud.com/apps/mail [2] https://github.com/mail-in-a-box/mailinabox/blob/master/tool...
In How to leave Google and why
mastazi·Dec 20, 2020
Additional note: Nextcloud also comes as part of Mail-in-a-Box (MIAB). If you are using that version of Nextcloud, you need to know the following: 1- It uses SQLite, you can't change this easily as the same SQLite is also accessed by MIAB to sync contacts and calendar functionality. The Nextcloud devs don't recommend SQLite for multi user servers. [1] 2- MIAB supports using Nextcloud for managing contacts and calendar but file management is not officially supported so if you want to use that same installation of Nextcloud for storing your files, you won't get support from the MIAB devs in relation to any issue related to files storage [2] (in that case you will have to seek help from the Nexcloud community). 3- As a result of the 2 points above, for multiuser installations you may want to have a second instance of Nextcloud, backed by Pos
Read the rest
tgres or MariaDB, just for your files storage, while you can keep using the version included in MIAB for contacts and calendar. However, for a single user installation, you would be fine using the version of Nextcloud that comes in MIAB (I have been doing that for a long time and I'm fine, mine is a single-user system). 4- The version of Nextcloud that is included in MIAB by default locks access to the admin interface, this can be unlocked using the provided script [3] 5- The automated backups that MIAB creates, will also include all your Nextcloud flies, not just email, calendar and contacts. So if you have a lot of files it's a good idea to use the S3 backup functionality instead of the default on-disk backup method (otherwise backups files will soon eat up all your storage). In my case I use the MIAB S3 backups feature, and I save my data in Digitalocean Spaces which is S3-compatible [4] [1] https://docs.nextcloud.com/server/stable/admin_manual/config... [2] See par. "What’s inside the box?" https://mailinabox.email/ [3] https://github.com/mail-in-a-box/mailinabox/blob/master/tool... [4] https://www.digitalocean.com/docs/spaces/resources/s3-sdk-ex...
In Setting up your own Nextcloud instance to get off of Google

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