Self-host Piler
piler-1.4.9Open-source email archiving with compliance features
docker compose up -d- Stars
- 356
- CPU
- 2+ CPU cores
- RAM
- 2+ GB memory
- Storage
- 200+ GB disk
- Ports
- 25 (SMTP), 80 (HTTP web interface), 443 (HTTPS web interface)
- Requires
- Manticore Search, MariaDB/MySQL, Memcached
sutoj/piler
What is Piler?
Piler is an open-source email archiving application designed for organizations that need to retain emails for compliance, legal, or operational reasons. It provides a built-in SMTP server for seamless archiving, full-text search with simple and advanced query interfaces, message and attachment deduplication, zlib compression, AES-256 encryption, digital signing for tamper-proof archives, retention and legal hold policies, and support for importing from EML, Maildir, and mbox formats. The web interface offers AD/LDAP authentication, Google OAuth, IMAP/POP3 auth, single sign-on, and two-factor authentication via Google Authenticator. Piler can be deployed via Docker Compose (with MariaDB, Manticore Search, and Memcached), installed from deb packages on Ubuntu, or built from source. The project offers both a free Open Source Edition and a paid Enterprise Edition with additional features like AI-powered search, SAML/OIDC, multi-tenancy, and S3 storage.
Should you self-host Piler?
Piler scores 49/100 on selfhost.directory (how scoring works) and ranks #61 of 106 in Email. It has 356 GitHub stars.
It shipped 1 stable release in the past year. The latest, piler-1.4.9, came out on 17 June 2026.
Setup is advanced: plan for several services and some ongoing maintenance. An official Docker image is available. It is Other-licensed and written mostly in PHP.
Its closest alternative on selfhost.directory is Listmonk (80/100, 24 016 stars). It scores higher overall, so compare the two before you pick. See Piler vs Listmonk side by side.
Features
- Access control
- Audit Logs
- Built-in SMTP server
- Compression
- Digital signing & verification
- Encryption
- Full-Text Search
- Import/Export
- Internationalization
- LDAP/AD Authentication
- Legal hold
- Message deduplication
- Retention rules
- Single Sign-On (SSO)
- Two-factor authentication
Piler README
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