📄️ Welcome to Stalwart
Welcome to Stalwart, an open-source mail and collaboration server designed for the modern internet. Stalwart supports a wide range of protocols including JMAP, IMAP4, POP3, SMTP, CalDAV, CardDAV, and WebDAV, making it a comprehensive solution for managing email, calendars, contacts, file storage, and more. Built in Rust, Stalwart is engineered to be secure, fast, robust, and scalable, capable of running everything from small personal mail servers to large, distributed enterprise deployments.
📄️ System Requirements
Stalwart is a high-performance mail and collaboration server designed to scale efficiently from small personal deployments to large enterprise environments. Its resource requirements—particularly in terms of memory and CPU—are highly dependent on usage patterns, including the number of concurrent connections and the intensity of client activity. This document provides guidance on estimating and managing memory and CPU requirements to ensure optimal performance across different deployment scenarios.
🗃️ Installation
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📄️ Choosing a database
Stalwart employs a modular storage architecture that separates different types of data into four distinct stores. This design provides flexibility and allows each storage component to be optimized independently, depending on the scale and needs of the deployment.
📄️ Choosing a directory
In Stalwart, a directory refers to the authentication backend responsible for managing user identities and access credentials. Directories are essential for validating login attempts, retrieving account-related information, and, in some cases, managing user configuration. Stalwart supports both internal and external directory configurations, giving administrators flexibility in how authentication is handled.
📄️ Setting up DNS
When deploying a mail server, correctly configuring DNS records is essential to ensure email delivery, client compatibility, and security. DNS records direct email traffic, authenticate outgoing messages, enforce transport security, and enable mail clients to discover and connect to the server automatically.
📄️ Securing your server
Stalwart is secure by design. From the moment it's deployed, it applies safe, security-conscious defaults that follow best practices for modern mail server operation. Out of the box, it includes built-in defense mechanisms to protect against common threats. For example, Stalwart can automatically detect and block IP addresses that attempt brute-force password attacks, guess account names, scan for vulnerabilities, or launch SYN flood attacks. These protections operate continuously to reduce the risk of abuse and compromise.
📄️ Performance tuning
Stalwart is engineered for efficiency and can handle substantial workloads even with default settings. For small or personal deployments, extensive performance tuning is rarely necessary—default configurations are more than sufficient to deliver reliable performance. However, for larger-scale or high-traffic environments, fine-tuning specific parameters can help unlock the full potential of your server and ensure optimal responsiveness under load.