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The Control Panel
This page began as a chapter of the 6.2.10 manual and has been corrected for 6.2.24. The Control Panel's pages are grouped differently now, so the paths below use today's groups; the TLS ports 465, 993 and 995 exist only after you create them on the TCP/IP ports page (a fresh install seeds 25, 587, 110 and 143); and everything added since 6.2.10 is in Changes Since 6.2.10. Where a value here disagrees with the Settings Reference, which is generated from the code, the reference is right.
The hMailServer Control Panel (hMailCP.exe) is how you administer the server. It
is a .NET 10 desktop application that talks to the server over the COM API — which means
it can administer a server on another machine just as easily as the local one.
Launch it from the Start menu.
The screenshots on this page were captured from a 6.2.10 build and still show the older navigation tree and the six-tile Welcome page; the text describes the current Control Panel.
| Field | What to enter |
|---|---|
| Server |
localhost for the machine you are sitting at, or the remote server's name/IP |
| User name | Administrator |
| Password | The administration password you set during installation |
| Language (in the tree after 6.2.27, not yet released) | Optional: one of seventeen languages, or leave it on "Windows display language"; changing it restarts the Control Panel |
If a second factor is enrolled on the administrator credential (recommended; enforced by the server on every client), or two-factor authentication is set up for this Control Panel alone, you are asked for a six-digit code next — see Control Panel Reference, section 3.
The Welcome page opens with What do you want to do? — twelve starting points written as outcomes ("Mail is stuck or slow", "Add a domain or a mailbox", "Stop the spam", "Someone is guessing passwords", "Let a device or printer send mail", "Renew or install a certificate", "Send everything through my provider", "Back up the configuration and the mail" ...), each one click from the page that does it — followed by Or browse by area, six tiles for the areas you will visit most. It is the fastest route to "add a domain" when you are starting out.
The left sidebar is the navigation tree, grouped by what you are trying to do:
Welcome ← what do you want to do?
Dashboard ← live counters and charts
Monitoring & troubleshooting ← is mail flowing, and if not, where has it stopped?
Server status, Delivery queue, Diagnosing stalled mail, Message trace,
Live logs, Diagnostics, MX query, External setup, DNS records,
Logging, API & monitoring, REST API keys
Accounts & domains ← Domains, Public folders, Groups
Mail flow & delivery ← Delivery of e-mail, Routes, Incoming relays,
Rules, Server messages, Server sendout
Spam & virus filtering ← overviews, Quarantine, Anti-spam settings,
SURBL, DNSBL, white lists, Blocked senders, Anti-virus settings,
Blocked attachments
Connections & protocols ← Protocols, TCP/IP ports,
Web services & autoconfiguration, DNS resolver
TLS & certificates ← SSL certificates, Certificates (ACME),
Transport encryption overview, SSL/TLS, Transport security
Access & abuse protection ← Authentication, LDAP, Directory synchronisation,
Administrative access, Auto-ban, IP ranges
Maintenance ← Backup & restore, Performance, Advanced,
Event scripts, Server limits & expert settings
About
Every page is listed with its purpose in Control Panel Reference, section 5.
Press Ctrl+K (or the Search button above the tree) once you are connected for the command palette — type a page name, what you are trying to do ("stop spam", "block an IP", "someone is guessing passwords") or a setting name or hMailServer.INI key, and jump straight to the page that owns it.
The window remembers its size, position and maximised state between sessions, and both light and dark themes are fully supported (it follows your Windows setting).
In the tree after 6.2.27 (not yet released) the Control Panel is also translated: it follows your Windows display language and ships in seventeen languages (English, Czech, Danish, German, Spanish, Finnish, French, Italian, Japanese, Norwegian bokmål, Dutch, Polish, Brazilian Portuguese, Russian, Swedish, Turkish, Ukrainian and Simplified Chinese). Pick one from the sign-in card or the globe button at the bottom of the sidebar; the Control Panel restarts in that language.
Live view of the server: uptime, messages processed, the queue (with a Backlog badge when it grows), spam and viruses stopped, and two charts — throughput and sessions — over the last few minutes or, when the server keeps metric history, the last 24 hours, 7 days or 30 days. A card at the bottom says what still needs doing outside the server (DNS records, keys, trusted lists). This is the page to leave open on a second monitor; the state of the service itself is on Server status.