Install Mailcow Using Docker and Docker Compose – mailcow: dockerized Tutorial

Mailcow is a user-friendly mail system for sending, receiving and managing email. In this tutorial you'll install mailcow using Docker on your VPS server. Mailcow's only officially-supported install method uses the consistency and ease of Docker and dockerized services, so this can be done quickly if you already have a functional Docker setup in place. That said, here are some prerequisites for Mailcow, as well as the steps to follow to get Mailcow up and running.

Prerequisites

• Docker and docker-compose installed and configured, as well as docker-compose
• A-Name record for email server address
• FQDN chosen and configured (can use the same address as above)
• MX Record for primary domain
• SSL Certificate for mail server
• Required ports open
• At least 3GB of RAM available on your VPS

Installing Mailcow using Docker and Docker Compose

Assuming Docker is all setup and ready to go, the installation process is fairly straightforward. Docker makes things a lot simpler, as packages and dependencies are self-managed within each docker image or package. All you need is to clone the mailcow: dockerized repository, configure it, then launch it.

Step 1: Check Umask Settings

First, we’ll need to ensure that the unmask settings for the operating system are correct. Typically, this is already the case, but it never hurts to check.

umask
0022

You’ll want to run the umask command, and if it isn’t 0022, modify your systems umask settings to match that.

Step 2: Clone the mailcow: dockerized Repository

Next, we’ll switch to the /opt folder and create our working directory. Git must be installed for this part, although most Linux-based operating systems have it available in their default repository, if not installed already.

cd /opt
git clone https://github.com/mailcow/mailcow-dockerized
cd mailcow-dockerized

Now, we will generate the configuration file that Mailcow will use. Luckily, there’s a simple-to-use script that allows us to just enter a few pieces of information to get this