Linux / MacOS

To install Stalwart on Linux or MacOS, execute the following command in your terminal:

$ curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://get.stalw.art/install.sh -o install.sh

Then, execute the installation script as root. The default installation directory is /opt/stalwart. If you want to install Stalwart in a different directory, you can specify the installation directory as an argument:

$ sudo sh install.sh /path/to/install

If you are planning to use FoundationDB as the backend, add the --fdb parameter to the installation script to download the version compiled with FoundationDB support.

Log in to the web interface

Once the installation is complete, the installation script will print out the administrator account and password:

$ sudo sh install.sh
✅ Configuration file written to /opt/stalwart/etc/config.toml
🔑 Your administrator account is 'admin' with password 'w95Yuiu36E'.
🎉 Installation complete! Continue the setup at http://yourserver.org:8080/login

With this information, you can log in to the web interface at http://yourserver.org:8080/login.

Choose where to store your data

Once you have logged in, go to the Settings > Storage section and configure your data, blob, full-text and in-memory stores. Read the choosing a database section for more details on the available options.

If you would like an external authentication directory such as LDAP or SQL, go to the Settings > Authentication section and configure your authentication backend.

Configure your hostname and domain

Next, make sure that the server hostname in Settings > Server > Network is correct. Then, add your main domain name in Management > Directory > Domains. After creating the domain, the interface will display the DNS records that you need to add to your domain’s DNS settings.

For example:

MX  example.org.                      10 mail.example.org.
TXT 202404e._domainkey.example.org.   v=DKIM1; k=ed25519; h=sha256; p=MCowBQYDK2VwAyEAOT2JN9F8SLTVFNEODDu22SD9RJDC282mugCAeXkzjH0=
TXT 202404r._domainkey.example.org.   v=DKIM1; k=rsa; h=sha256; p=MIIBIjANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOCAQ8AMIIBCgKCAQEAykeYJjv5N0AlnJ8gKF+/8qjbStiMFWvPg+p3JPh96GPXEN6l9W/Ee6Lag6i3vLyTVH5dnRVRBhfWhc+Dc0nKreZe4f5i4L5M4RI31+RpEgu4bCmncUIk2WzJgGBW5XbiOwXjge6OKWtJQN9d8Lc1AuryL5xeged9iS6xd/+EJz4WxAf18U+j38xmAm8fJUTBnQVeb/AZup+voSKAS59jyumsb0jQtXfX5xnwTFXdiX2OF8LRrmmNs/ObHozgHftxAv+YCiSU4bqSlKNPQIrN5kk1YnZDnLlc1Gr66AWlmdUVE7PWtZPTy4f8+uHO93EW3WUxLmynZm+Syn9FTJC2uwIDAQAB
TXT mail.example.org.                 v=spf1 a -all ra=postmaster
TXT example.org.                      v=spf1 mx -all ra=postmaster
TXT _dmarc.example.org.               v=DMARC1; p=reject; rua=mailto:[email protected]; ruf=mailto:[email protected]

Enable TLS

Stalwart requires a valid TLS certificate to secure the connection between the server and the client. You can enable TLS in one of the following ways:

If you already have a TLS certificate for your server, you can upload it in the Settings > Server > TLS > Certificates section.
If you don’t have a certificate, you can enable automatic TLS certificates from Let’s Encrypt using ACME. To enable ACME, go to the Settings > Server > TLS > ACME Providers section and add Let’s Encrypt as your ACME provider making sure that your server hostname is listed as one of the Subject Names. Stalwart supports the tls-alpn-01, dns-01 and http-01 challenges, if you are unsure which one to use, read the ACME challenge types documentation.
If you are running Stalwart behind a reverse proxy such as Traefik, Caddy, HAProxy or NGINX, you should skip this step and configure TLS in your reverse proxy instead.

Restart service

Once you have completed the setup instructions, restart Stalwart:

$ sudo systemctl restart stalwart

Or, if you are using MacOS:

$ sudo launchctl kickstart -k stalwart.mail

Next steps

If you have selected to use the internal directory, you can now add your users in the Management > Directory > Accounts section. If you have selected an external directory, you will need to create users in your directory server.

If everything went well, your users should now be able to connect to the server and send and receive emails. If you are unable to connect to the server, check the log files from the web-admin or under <INSTALL_DIR>/logs for any errors.

If you encounter any issues, please refer to the troubleshooting section for help. If you have questions please check the FAQ section or start a discussion in the community forum.

Setup demonstration

Setup screencast