Mail-in-a-Box
Mail-in-a-Box is an open-source, self-hosted app in the Email Servers category, licensed CC0-1.0 and written mainly in Python. It is a self-hosted alternative to Gmail. It has 15,450 GitHub stars and its last commit was on Oct 22, 2026 (data as of Oct 26, 2026).
GitHub stats
- GitHub stars
- 15,450
- Forks
- 1,563
- Open issues
- 554
- Commits, last 12 months
- 23
- Last commit
- Oct 22, 2026
- Latest release
- v77Sep 26, 2026
- Created
- Aug 21, 2013
- License
- CC0-1.0Open source
Data as of from the GitHub API. Report an error
Project health
ActiveActive: last commit Oct 22, 2026, last release Sep 26, 2026.
- Regular releases4 releases in 12 months
- Security policyPublishes a security policy on GitHub
| Last commit | Oct 22, 2026 |
|---|---|
| Commits, last 12 months | 23 |
| Latest release | v77 (Sep 26, 2026) |
| Releases, last 12 months | 4 |
| Releases, all time | 39 |
| Open issues | 554 |
| Open pull requests | 66 |
| Good first issues | 0 |
| Contributing guide | Yes |
| Security policy | Yes |
| Created | Aug 21, 2013 |
Health as of , from the GitHub API. A label describes activity, not quality or security. How we label project health · Report a data error
About Mail-in-a-Box
Turns any Ubuntu server into a fully functional mail server with one command.
Description adapted from awesome-selfhosted (CC BY-SA 3.0). Source code: github.com/mail-in-a-box/mailinabox.
Topics
- smtp
- server
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Is Mail-in-a-Box free and open source?
Yes. Mail-in-a-Box is open-source software released under the CC0-1.0 license, so you can self-host it at no cost. You only pay for the server it runs on, and some projects also offer an optional paid cloud plan.
Can I run Mail-in-a-Box with Docker?
Mail-in-a-Box does not list an official Docker image. It installs natively (Shell), so follow the install steps in its README or look for a community-maintained container.
What are the best alternatives to Mail-in-a-Box?
Popular self-hosted alternatives to Mail-in-a-Box include docker-mailserver, Postal and Stalwart Mail Server. Mail-in-a-Box itself is a self-hosted alternative to Gmail.
Is Mail-in-a-Box actively maintained?
The most recent commit to Mail-in-a-Box was on Oct 22, 2026 with 23 commits in the past twelve months. The latest release is v77, published Sep 26, 2026. It had 554 open issues on GitHub. appsgit's project-health label for it is "Active" as of Oct 26, 2026.