imap-backup ☆

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Description:
Backup GMail (or other IMAP) accounts to disk

Type: Formula | Tracked Since: Dec 28, 2025

Links: Homepage | formulae.brew.sh

Category: Productivity

Tags: email backup imap gmail archive cli

Install: brew install imap-backup

About:
ImapBackup is a command-line tool that securely backs up email from IMAP servers like GMail to local disk in standard MBOX format. It provides reliable, encrypted local copies of your emails, ensuring you have full control over your data. The tool supports incremental backups and can be easily automated via cron jobs for regular, hands-free operation.

Key Features:

Saves emails to standard MBOX format, readable by most email clients
Incremental backups to efficiently sync only new messages
Supports multiple accounts and IMAP servers
Optional GPG encryption for backed-up data
Easy automation via command-line or cron

Use Cases:

Creating regular, automated backups of a GMail account
Migrating email data from an IMAP server to a local archive
Ensuring data sovereignty by maintaining local copies of cloud-based email

Alternatives:

offlineimap – offlineimap is a more complex, two-way sync tool, whereas imap-backup focuses on simpler, one-way backups to MBOX.
getmail – getmail is a highly configurable mail retriever, while imap-backup offers a more streamlined experience focused on backup and archiving.

Version History

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