Cyrus IMAP
Email (IMAP/POP3), contacts and calendar server.
Actively maintained with regular releases.
Commit activity more than 89% of tracked projects; popularity more than 28%. How this is calculated.
Commits, last 11 months
| Stars | 649 |
|---|---|
| Latest release | cyrus-imapd-3.8.8 · 9 Sept 2026 |
| Repo updated | 26 Sept 2026 |
| Licence | BSD-3-Clause-Attribution |
| Built with | C |
Is Cyrus IMAP actively maintained?
Over the last 11 months the project absorbed 2036 commits, of which 854 arrived in the most recent quarter — roughly 285 commits a month.
Activity is accelerating: the last quarter carried 100% more commits than the one before it.
The most recent tagged release, cyrus-imapd-3.8.8, shipped within the last month — a current, installable version exists today.
Cyrus IMAP ranks #2 of 3 in Communication - Email - Mail Delivery Agents, placing it mid-table for maintenance activity.
What Cyrus IMAP actually does
Cyrus IMAP is a mail server that handles IMAP and POP3 protocols, alongside integrated support for contacts and calendars. It provides backend storage and retrieval services for email infrastructure, making it suitable for administrators building a self-hosted mail system. Written in C, it operates as a foundational component within a larger mail delivery architecture.
Best fit: Systems administrators and technical users who need a traditional, standards-compliant mail storage backend for their own infrastructure.
Worth knowing: Configuring a complete mail server stack involves significant operational complexity and careful management of security certificates, DNS records, and spam filtering.
Deployment notes
As a C-based server daemon, it typically requires persistent storage for mail spools and databases, along with a reverse proxy or direct network configuration to handle secure TLS connections.
Links
Alternatives to Cyrus IMAP
Projects in the same categories, ordered by health score.
IMAP and POP3 server written primarily with security in mind.
POP/IMAP/SMTP/Caldav/Carddav/LDAP exchange gateway allowing users to use any mail/calendar client with an Exchange server, even from the internet or behind a firewall through Outlook Web Access.