Mail-in-a-Box vs MailHog
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted mail servers options
— licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one
replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Compare Mail-in-a-Box with
choose an app… Nextcloud listmonk Docker Mailserver Mailspring Postal Stalwart Mail Server mailcow Mautic Mailpit Mailpile CryptPad Mailu Roundcube Himalaya SimpleLogin ONLYOFFICE Docs MailCatcher Maddy Mail Server Mox Mailtrain Haraka AnonAddy RainLoop imapsync smtp4dev NeoMutt Modoboa Collabora Online aerc OnlyOffice Community Server Dittofeed Rspamd Keila emailwiz SendPortal SOGo WildDuck Mailvelope iRedMail Cypht SnappyMail Forward Email Cuttlefish DebOps swaks parsedmarc Cozy PostfixAdmin Dovecot Nextcloud Groupware Apache James Nextcloud Mail chasquid Sup Betterbird imapfilter OpenTrashmail notmuch Sieve Editor meli phpList Exim alot alps LibreOffice Online Lieer Cyrus IMAP OfflineIMAP Larch OpenSMTPD Postfix ViMbAdmin Chatmail Mailman isync MailWhale Afterlogic WebMail Lite afew Apache SpamAssassin Sympa Simple NixOS Mailserver Calligra Suite EGroupware msmtp fdm Group-Office DragonFly Mail Agent Claws Mail Fetchmail HyperKitty piler Postorius Nullmailer getmail6 OpenDMARC OpenDKIM bogofilter Citadel Schleuder Dovecot Pigeonhole Tine DKIMpy Milter mpop Courier Mail Server Afterlogic DAV b1gMail Dovel EmailRelay Inboxen Sendmail Sendy SquirrelMail
Compare MailHog with
choose an app… listmonk Docker Mailserver Mailspring Postal Stalwart Mail Server mailcow Mautic Mailpit Mailpile Mailu Roundcube Himalaya SimpleLogin MailCatcher Maddy Mail Server Mox Mailtrain Haraka AnonAddy RainLoop imapsync smtp4dev NeoMutt Modoboa aerc Dittofeed Rspamd Keila emailwiz SendPortal WildDuck Mailvelope iRedMail Cypht SnappyMail Forward Email Cuttlefish DebOps swaks parsedmarc PostfixAdmin Dovecot Apache James Nextcloud Mail chasquid Sup Betterbird imapfilter OpenTrashmail notmuch Sieve Editor meli phpList Exim alot alps Lieer Cyrus IMAP OfflineIMAP Larch OpenSMTPD Postfix ViMbAdmin Chatmail Mailman isync MailWhale Afterlogic WebMail Lite afew Apache SpamAssassin Sympa Simple NixOS Mailserver msmtp fdm DragonFly Mail Agent Claws Mail Fetchmail HyperKitty piler Postorius Nullmailer getmail6 OpenDMARC OpenDKIM bogofilter Schleuder Dovecot Pigeonhole DKIMpy Milter mpop Courier Mail Server Afterlogic DAV b1gMail Dovel EmailRelay Inboxen Sendmail Sendy SquirrelMail
Feature Mail-in-a-Box MailHog Category Mail Servers Mail Servers License CC0-1.0 MIT Language Python Go Setup difficulty Easy Easy Min. RAM 1,024 MB 64 MB Deployment bare-metal, one-click docker, binary, source GitHub stars ★ 15,385 ★ 16,107 First released 2014 2014 Replaces Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 Mailtrap
Why pick each one
Choose MailHog if… Released under the MIT license Easy to set up — beginner-friendly First-class Docker support for quick deployment Mature project with 16.1k GitHub stars MailHog details
Frequently asked questions Is Mail-in-a-Box or MailHog better? Neither is universally better. MailHog has the larger community; both share a easy setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Mail-in-a-Box and MailHog free and open-source? Yes. Mail-in-a-Box is licensed under CC0-1.0 and MailHog under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Mail-in-a-Box and MailHog with Docker? Mail-in-a-Box: check the project docs for container support. MailHog: yes.