Postal vs SnappyMail
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?
Postal
Complete mail delivery platform for outgoing email
VS
SnappyMail
Lightweight, fast and modern webmail client
| Feature | Postal | SnappyMail |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Mail Servers | Mail Servers |
| License | MIT | AGPL-3.0 |
| Language | Ruby | PHP |
| Setup difficulty | Hard | Easy |
| Min. RAM | 2,048 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | docker, bare-metal | docker, bare-metal, source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 16,724 | ★ 1,670 |
| First released | 2017 | 2021 |
| Replaces | SendGrid, Mailgun, Postmark | Gmail, Outlook Web |
Why pick each one
Frequently asked questions
Is Postal or SnappyMail better?
Neither is universally better. Postal has the larger community, while SnappyMail is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Postal and SnappyMail free and open-source?
Yes. Postal is licensed under MIT and SnappyMail under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Postal and SnappyMail with Docker?
Postal: yes. SnappyMail: yes.