DOVEADM-EXPUNGE(1) Dovecot DOVEADM-EXPUNGE(1)
NAME
doveadm-expunge - Expunge messages matching given search query
SYNOPSIS
doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] expunge [-S socket_path] [-d] -A search_query
doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] expunge [-S socket_path] [-d] -F file
search_query
doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] expunge [-S socket_path] [-d] --no-userdb-
lookup search_query
doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] expunge [-S socket_path] [-d] -u user
search_query
DESCRIPTION
This command can be used to expunge mails matching the given search
query. It is typically used to expunge old mails from users' Trash
and/or Spam mailboxes. To test which messages a given search query would
match, you can use doveadm fetch or doveadm search commands.
In the first form, the command will be performed for all users.
In the second form, doveadm(1) will expunge messages of the users listed
in the given
In the third form, the command will be performed for the user contained
in the USER environment variable.
In the final form, only matching mails of the given user (s) will be ex-
punged.
GLOBAL OPTIONS
Global doveadm(1)
-D
Enables verbosity and debug messages.
-O
Do not read any config file, just use defaults. The dovecot_stor-
age_version setting defaults to the latest version, but can be over-
ridden with
-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/dove-
cot.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 mul-
tiple settings, the -o option may be specified multiple times.
OPTIONS
-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 lay-
out.
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.
-d
Delete the mailbox if it is empty after expunging.
-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 do-
main 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).
ARGUMENTS
search_query
Expunge messages matching this search query. See doveadm-search-
query(7) for details.
EXAMPLE
This example expunges messages from Spam mailbox that were saved/copied
there more than two weeks ago:
doveadm expunge -u jane.doe@example.org mailbox Spam savedbefore 2w
REPORTING BUGS
Report bugs, including doveconf -n output, to the Dovecot Mailing List
⟨dovecot@dovecot.org⟩. Information about reporting bugs is available at:
https://dovecot.org/bugreport.html
SEE ALSO
doveadm(1), doveadm-search(1)
78ffb79 March 2025 DOVEADM-EXPUNGE(1)
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