DOVEADM-FETCH(1) Dovecot DOVEADM-FETCH(1)

doveadm-fetch - Fetch partial/full messages or message information

doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] [-f formatter] fetch [-S socket_path] -A fields search_query

doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] [-f formatter] fetch [-S socket_path] -F file fields search_query

doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] [-f formatter] fetch [-S socket_path] --no-userdb-lookup fields search_query

doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] [-f formatter] fetch [-S socket_path] -u user fields search_query

doveadm fetch can be used to fetch messages' contents and metadata. This can be useful for scripts and for debugging. If you want to fetch messages one at a time, see doveadm-search(1).

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Please respect your users' privacy.

Global doveadm(1) options:

-D

Enables verbosity and debug messages.

-O

Do not read any config file, just use defaults. The dovecot_storage_version setting defaults to the latest version, but can be overridden with -o.

-k

Preserve entire environment for doveadm, not just import_environment setting.

-v

Enables verbosity, including progress counter.

-i instance-name

If using multiple Dovecot instances, choose the config file based on this instance name.

See instance_name setting for more information.

-c config-file

Read configuration from the given config-file. By default it first reads config socket, and then falls back to /etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf. You can also point this to config socket of some instance running compatible version.

-o setting=value

Overrides the configuration setting from /etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf and from the userdb with the given value. In order to override multiple settings, the -o option may be specified multiple times.

-f formatter

Specifies the formatter for formatting the output. Supported formatters are:

flow

prints each line with key=value pairs.

json

prints a JSON array of JSON objects.

pager

prints each key: value pair on its own line and separates records with form feed character (^L).

tab

prints a table header followed by tab separated value lines.

table

prints a table header followed by adjusted value lines.

This command uses by default the output formatter pager.

-A

If the -A option is present, the command will be performed for all users. Using this option in combination with system users from userdb { driver = passwd } is not recommended, because it contains also users with a lower UID than the one configured with the first_valid_uid setting.

When the SQL userdb module is used, make sure that the userdb_sql_iterate_query setting setting matches your database layout.

When using the LDAP userdb module, make sure that the userdb_fields setting and userdb_ldap_iterate_fields setting settings match your LDAP schema. Otherwise doveadm(1) will be unable to iterate over all users.

-F file

Execute the command for all the users in the file. This is similar to the -A option, but instead of getting the list of users from the userdb, they are read from the given file. The file contains one username per line.

--no-userdb-lookup

Do not perform userdb lookup. Use the USER environment variable to specify the username.

-S socket_path

The option's argument is either an absolute path to a local UNIX domain socket, or a hostname and port (hostname:port), in order to connect a remote host via a TCP socket.

This allows an administrator to execute doveadm(1) mail commands through the given socket.

-u user/mask

Run the command only for the given user. It's also possible to use '*' and '?' wildcards (e.g. -u *@example.org).

fields

One or more result field names to display, if the search_query matches any messages. In order to specify multiple fields, enclose them in single or double quotes.

Supported fields are:

binary : Message body in decoded format.

binary.<section> : Part of the body decoded, e.g. binary.1

body : The body of a message.

body.<section> : Part of the body, e.g. body.1

body.preview : Short preview of the body.

body.snippet : Old alias for preview.

date.received : Date and time of final delivery, when the message was delivered to a user's mailbox for the first time.

The internal date and time of the source message, when the message was copied by the IMAP COPY command.

The date-time attribute when present, otherwise the current time, when the message was saved by the IMAP APPEND command.

date.received.unixtime : date.received as unix timestamp.

date.saved : Date and time when the message was saved to mailbox.

date.saved.unixtime : date.saved as unix timestamp.

date.sent : Date and time of the message's Date: header.

date.sent.unixtime : date.sent as unix timestamp.

flags : A message's IMAP flags, e.g. \Seen

guid : A message's globally unique identifier.

hdr : The header of the message.

hdr.<name> : Named header from the message.

imap.body : IMAP BODY output of the message (see RFC 3501).

imap.bodystructure : IMAP BODYSTRUCTURE output of the message (see RFC 3501).

imap.envelope : IMAP ENVELOPE output of the message (see RFC 3501).

mailbox : Name of the mailbox, in which the message is stored. The name is in UTF-8.

mailbox-guid : The globally unique identifier of the mailbox, in which the message is located.

modseq : Modification sequence number for the mail.

pop3.order : A message's order number within a mailbox.

pop3.uidl : A message's unique (POP3) identifier within a mailbox.

refcount : Mail reference count, mdbox only.

seq : A message's sequence number in a mailbox.

size.physical : A message's physical size.

size.virtual : A message's virtual size, computed with CRLF line terminators.

storageid : Mailbox driver specific ID for the mail.

text : The entire message (header and body).

text.utf8 : The entire message (header and body) — UTF-8 encoded.

uid : A message's unique (IMAP) identifier in a mailbox.

user : A message owner's login name.

search_query

Fetch messages matching this search query. See doveadm-search-query(1) for details.

This example based on the first example from doveadm-search(1). We are fetching the fields mailbox and date.sent from user bob's mailbox with the guid "3a94c928d66ebe4bda04000015811c6a" for the messages with the UIDs 8, 25 and 45.

doveadm fetch -u bob "mailbox date.sent" mailbox-guid 3a94c928d66ebe4bda04000015811c6a uid 8,25,45
mailbox: dovecot/pigeonhole/2.0
date.sent: 2010-01-19 01:17:41 (+0100)
^L
mailbox: dovecot/pigeonhole/2.0
date.sent: 2010-01-28 09:38:49 (+0100)
^L
mailbox: dovecot/pigeonhole/2.0
date.sent: 2010-03-28 18:41:14 (+0200)

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doveadm(1)

May 2026 e5ac02a