Browser-based email client applications for reading, composing, and managing email through a web interface. All available with one-click installation on 365i web hosting.
A webmail client is a browser front end to a mailbox that lives somewhere else. It speaks IMAP to read mail and SMTP to send it, and it stores almost none of the mail itself: what it keeps is your address book, your preferences and your signatures. That distinction matters more than it sounds, because it means installing one does not move your email, and it does not back your email up.
Roundcube is the one that is alive. Version 1.7.0 arrived in May 2026 after nearly four years of development, and 1.7.3 followed on 9 August 2026 with a batch of security fixes. It needs PHP 8.1 or newer, and since November 2023 the project has been under Nextcloud's stewardship after its founder stepped back. Almost every host that ships a webmail client ships this one. SquirrelMail is the one that is not. Its last numbered release, 1.4.22, came out on 12 July 2011. Everything since has been unreleased development snapshots, and cPanel dropped it from its webmail options in version 78 rather than carry on patching it.
Before you install either, read this bit. Every 365i hosting plan already includes webmail on every mailbox, so running your own is a niche choice. It is a reasonable one for two situations: you want webmail on your own domain carrying your own branding, or you need a browser client for an IMAP account that is not hosted here at all. Outside those two, you are mostly adding something else to patch.
Situations we see often. If one of these sounds like you, this category is worth a look.
A solicitors practice or accountancy with twenty staff mailboxes wants webmail at their own address, carrying their logo and colours rather than a generic host interface. Roundcube on a subdomain of the same hosting account does that with a skin and a configuration file, and the mailboxes stay exactly where they are.
The mail server is a legacy on-premise box, or a provider whose own webmail is unusable, and staff need something workable from any browser. Roundcube installed here connects out over IMAP and SMTP to that server, which means nobody has to migrate mailboxes just to fix a bad interface.
An agency testing transactional email needs somewhere to read what the application actually sent, without routing test messages into real inboxes. A small Roundcube install pointed at a catch-all test mailbox costs a subdirectory and does the job a mail-testing subscription would otherwise be billed for.
Somebody has taken over a server with SquirrelMail sitting in front of live mailbox credentials and needs it gone before it becomes an incident. The replacement is Roundcube on a supported PHP branch, or simply the webmail already included with the hosting, and the mail itself is untouched either way.
We strongly recommend to update all productive installations of Roundcube 1.6.x and 1.7.x with this new versions.
Webmail is one of the few things you can self-host where a missed patch has an immediate, concrete cost, because the login page sits on the public internet in front of live mailbox credentials. That August release covered remote code execution and several injection issues. If you run your own, you are the one who has to be watching for the announcement.
I'm proud and thankful for the many years with Roundcube and I'm now very happy to see our project in good hands to remain a vital contributor for IT decentralization.
Succession matters more for mail software than for a blog. Roundcube had a handover, which is why it still ships releases and still fixes vulnerabilities on a schedule. SquirrelMail never had one, and the result is fifteen years without a numbered release. Ask who is actually on the hook before installing anything that touches email.
Webmail is mostly an IMAP client wrapped in a browser, so the hosting question is more about the IMAP server than the webmail PHP. We pair our webmail installs with a properly configured mail server, monitor IMAP latency, and tune the outbound SMTP path with proper SPF, DKIM, and DMARC so the messages your team sends from webmail reach inboxes rather than spam folders. Daily backups cover the configuration but, importantly, the mail itself lives on our mail platform with its own redundancy.
Start with the awkward part. Every plan here already gives every mailbox webmail, so your own installation has to earn its place. "Our branding on the login screen" earns it. "It has to reach an IMAP server on another network" earns it. "I want to read my email in a browser" does not, because you already can.
SquirrelMail should not be sitting in front of a live mailbox in 2026. Last numbered release July 2011, PHP 8 compatibility only ever present in unreleased snapshots, and dropped by cPanel rather than patched any further. If you have one running, treat replacing it as routine maintenance rather than as a project to schedule for next quarter.
Roundcube 1.7 carries a real shared-hosting trap. From that version the public_html directory inside the Roundcube tree is a mandatory entry point, so the web server has to serve from there rather than from the top of the installation. On an account that already has its own public_html the two collide, and people end up with public_html sitting in the middle of their webmail address. Put Roundcube on its own subdomain and point that subdomain at the right directory once the installer has finished.
It also wants a database of its own, PHP 8.1 or newer, and a login page that credential-stuffing bots will find within a week.
Common questions we hear from people running webmail client applications on 365i hosting.
No. Every plan includes unlimited mailboxes on your own domain, and every mailbox comes with webmail access alongside IMAP and POP3 for desktop and phone clients. Installing Roundcube yourself is worth doing when you want webmail on your own domain with your own branding, or when you need a browser client for a mailbox hosted somewhere else entirely. If the goal is simply reading email in a browser, you already have that, and a second client is another thing to keep patched.
No, and it has not been for a long time. The last numbered release, 1.4.22, was published on 12 July 2011. Everything after it has been unreleased development snapshots, PHP 8 compatibility only ever appeared in those snapshots, and cPanel removed SquirrelMail from its webmail options in version 78 rather than keep patching the code. What you have is a public login page in front of live mailbox credentials with no release cadence behind it. If you are running one, replace it.
Yes, and it is one of the better reasons to install it. Roundcube talks IMAP to read mail and SMTP to send it, so the mail server can be anywhere your hosting can reach: another provider, an office server, an older system nobody wants to migrate yet. Set the IMAP and SMTP hosts in the configuration and the mailboxes never move. Check the far end accepts connections from an external address and has TLS configured, because plenty of internal mail servers are firewalled to their own network.
Mostly no. A webmail client reads mail over IMAP and leaves it on the mail server, which is why installing one neither moves your email nor backs it up. What it does keep locally is the address book, preferences, signatures, sometimes drafts, and temporary copies of attachments while you are viewing them. Those live in its own database and temp directory, so they sit inside your daily hosting backups, but none of that adds up to a mail archive.
Roundcube 1.7 requires PHP 8.1 or newer. Support for older versions was dropped in that release, along with Internet Explorer and the MS SQL Server and Oracle database drivers. The 1.6 branch is in long-term support and receives security fixes only. PHP version is selectable per package in the My365i control panel, so put the account on a current PHP 8 branch before installing rather than after. Running webmail on an unsupported PHP branch is not a corner worth cutting.
Get Webmail Client apps up and running in minutes with our fast, reliable web hosting. Every plan includes one-click installation, free SSL, UK, US & Asia data centres, and dedicated expert support.
All prices exclude VAT. No contract, cancel any time.
All 2 webmail client applications available with one-click installation on our fast UK web hosting.
