DOVEADM-INSTANCE(1) Dovecot DOVEADM-INSTANCE(1)
NAME
doveadm-instance - Manage the list of running Dovecot instances
SYNOPSIS
doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] instance list [-c] [name]
doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] instance remove name
DESCRIPTION
The doveadm instance commands are used to manage the list of Dovecot in-
stances running on the server. In most installations there is only one
Dovecot instance, but in some cases is may be useful to have more (e.g.
running proxy and backend in the same server).
Instances are added to the list automatically when Dovecot is started.
Each instance is uniquely identified by its base_dir setting. Instances
can be named by setting instance_name in each instance's dovecot.conf.
When an instance is named, it can be accessed easily by giving -i in-
stance_name command line parameter for Dovecot binaries (e.g. doveadm).
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.
-f formatter
Specifies the formatter for formatting the output. Supported format-
ters are:
flow
prints each line with key=value pairs.
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.
ARGUMENTS
name
The value of an instance's instance_name setting. Each instance can
also be uniquely identified by its base_dir setting.
COMMANDS
instance list
doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] instance list [-c] [name]
This command lists the seen Dovecot instances.
-c
Output the config path instead of instance information.
instance remove
doveadm [GLOBAL OPTIONS] instance remove name
This command removes the specified instance.
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)
78ffb79 March 2025 DOVEADM-INSTANCE(1)
Generated by dwww version 1.16 on Tue Dec 16 06:20:27 CET 2025.