MailDev

SMTP server & web interface for viewing and testing emails during development.

MailDev dark theme interface screenshot MailDev light theme interface screenshot
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MailDev is sponsored by ⭐️  inngest/inngest. Inngest is an open-source, event-driven platform that makes it easy for developers to build, test and deploy serverless functions that are triggered by events. Check it out and give it a star!

MailDev is a simple way to test your project's generated emails during development with an easy-to-use web interface that runs on your machine.

MailDev interface screenshot
Test responsive emails
Resizable viewport to test your emails at different sizes.
MailDev interface screenshot
Switch between formats
View email HTML, plain text, headers or raw source.
MailDev interface screenshot
Search emails inbox
Convenient search feature to quickly find any email.

Programmatic & CLI

Use MailDev programmatically or via command line interface.

REST API

Manage your inbox and emails via easily consumable REST API.

Real-time

Live interface updates via WebSocket integration.

Browser notifications

Receive browser notifications whenever new email is received.

Relay

Retransmit incoming emails to an upstream SMTP server.

Attachments

Receive and view email attachments.

Dark theme

View your emails in an eye-friendly dark interface.

Built with Node.js

MailDev source code is written with JavaScript on top of Node.js.

MailDev

JavaScript Style Guide

MailDev is a simple way to test your project's generated emails during development with an easy to use web interface that runs on your machine. Built on top of Node.js.

MailDev Screenshot

Docker Run

If you want to use MailDev with Docker, you can use the soulteary/maildev image on Docker Hub. For a guide for usage with Docker, checkout the docs.

$ docker run -p 1080:1080 -p 1025:1025 soulteary/maildev

Usage

Usage: maildev [options]
Options Environment variable Description
-s, --smtp <port> MAILDEV_SMTP_PORT SMTP port to catch emails
-w, --web <port> MAILDEV_WEB_PORT Port to run the Web GUI
--mail-directory <path> MAILDEV_MAIL_DIRECTORY Directory for persisting mails
--https MAILDEV_HTTPS Switch from http to https protocol
--https-key <file> MAILDEV_HTTPS_KEY The file path to the ssl private key
--https-cert <file> MAILDEV_HTTPS_CERT The file path to the ssl cert file
--ip <ip address> MAILDEV_IP IP Address to bind SMTP service to
--outgoing-host <host> MAILDEV_OUTGOING_HOST SMTP host for outgoing emails
--outgoing-port <port> MAILDEV_OUTGOING_PORT SMTP port for outgoing emails
--outgoing-user <user> MAILDEV_OUTGOING_USER SMTP user for outgoing emails
--outgoing-pass <password> MAILDEV_OUTGOING_PASS SMTP password for outgoing emails
--outgoing-secure MAILDEV_OUTGOING_SECURE Use SMTP SSL for outgoing emails
--auto-relay [email] MAILDEV_AUTO_RELAY Use auto-relay mode. Optional relay email address
--auto-relay-rules <file> MAILDEV_AUTO_RELAY_RULES Filter rules for auto relay mode
--incoming-user <user> MAILDEV_INCOMING_USER SMTP user for incoming emails
--incoming-pass <pass> MAILDEV_INCOMING_PASS SMTP password for incoming emails
--web-ip <ip address> MAILDEV_WEB_IP IP Address to bind HTTP service to, defaults to --ip
--web-user <user> MAILDEV_WEB_USER HTTP user for GUI
--web-pass <password> MAILDEV_WEB_PASS HTTP password for GUI
--base-pathname <path> MAILDEV_BASE_PATHNAME Base path for URLs
--disable-web MAILDEV_DISABLE_WEB Disable the use of the web interface. Useful for unit testing
--hide-extensions <extensions> MAILDEV_HIDE_EXTENSIONS Comma separated list of SMTP extensions to NOT advertise (SMTPUTF8, PIPELINING, 8BITMIME)
-o, --open Open the Web GUI after startup
-v, --verbose
--silent
--log-mail-contents Log a JSON representation of each incoming mail

API

MailDev can be used in your Node.js application. For more info view the API docs.

const MailDev = require("maildev");

const maildev = new MailDev();

maildev.listen();

maildev.on("new", function (email) {
  // We got a new email!
});

MailDev also has a REST API. For more info view the docs.

Outgoing email

Maildev optionally supports selectively relaying email to an outgoing SMTP server. If you configure outgoing email with the --outgoing-* options you can click "Relay" on an individual email to relay through MailDev out to a real SMTP service that will *actually* send the email to the recipient.

Example:

$ maildev --outgoing-host smtp.gmail.com \
          --outgoing-secure \
          --outgoing-user 'you@gmail.com' \
          --outgoing-pass '<pass>'

Auto relay mode

Enabling the auto relay mode will automatically send each email to it's recipient without the need to click the "Relay" button mentioned above. The outgoing email options are required to enable this feature.

Optionally you may pass an single email address which Maildev will forward all emails to instead of the original recipient. For example, using --auto-relay you@example.com will forward all emails to that address automatically.

Additionally, you can pass a valid json file with additional configuration for what email addresses you would like to allow or deny. The last matching rule in the array will be the rule MailDev will follow.

Example:

$ maildev --outgoing-host smtp.gmail.com \
          --outgoing-secure \
          --outgoing-user 'you@gmail.com' \
          --outgoing-pass '<pass>' \
          --auto-relay \
          --auto-relay-rules file.json

Rules example file:

[
  { allow: "*" },
  { deny: "*@test.com" },
  { allow: "ok@test.com" },
  { deny: "*@utah.com" },
  { allow: "johnny@utah.com" },
];

This would allow angelo@fbi.gov, ok@test.com, johnny@utah.com, but deny bodhi@test.com.

Configure your project

Configure your application to send emails via port 1025 and open localhost:1080 in your browser.

Nodemailer (v1.0+)

// We add this setting to tell nodemailer the host isn't secure during dev
process.env.NODE_TLS_REJECT_UNAUTHORIZED = "0";

const transport = nodemailer.createTransport({
  port: 1025,
  // other settings...
});

Django -- Add EMAIL_PORT = 1025 in your settings file [source]

Rails -- config settings:

config.action_mailer.delivery_method = :smtp
    config.action_mailer.smtp_settings = {
        address: "localhost",
        port: 1025,
        enable_starttls_auto: false
    }

Drupal -- Install and configure SMTP module or use a library like SwiftMailer.

Features

Ideas

If you're using MailDev and you have a great idea, I'd love to hear it. If you're not using MailDev because it lacks a feature, I'd love to hear that too. Add an issue to the repo here.

Contributing

Any help on MailDev would be awesome. There is plenty of room for improvement. Feel free to create a Pull Request from small to big changes.

To run MailDev during development:

npm install
npm run dev

The "dev" task will run MailDev using nodemon and restart automatically when changes are detected. On *.scss file save, the css will also be recompiled. Using test/send.js, a few test emails will be sent every time the application restarts.

The project uses the JavaScript Standard coding style. To lint your code before submitting your PR, run npm run lint.

To run the test suite:

$ npm test

Changelog

Thanks

MailDev is built on using great open source projects including Express, AngularJS, Font Awesome and two great projects from Andris Reinman: smtp-server and mailparser. Many thanks to Andris as his projects are the backbone of this app and to MailCatcher for the inspiration.

Additionally, thanks to all the awesome contributors to the project.

License

MIT