Mailinator FAQ

Can I use Mailinator for Testing?

Yes!

Mailinator provides users with inboxes-on-demand and is a fantastic way to test the Email Workflow of your systems.

Mailinator Subscriptions supercharge your testing ability with Private Domains, API access, SMS numbers, Webhooks, and more. If you're using Mailinator for testing your email workflow, request a trial today!

What is Public Mailinator?

Public Mailinator is free, disposable, email. Every possible email address @mailinator.com is available for you (and everyone else) to use.

No Signup. No Login. You don't even "create" email addresses - They ALL already exist! That's right, every possible email address @mailinator.com already exists.

Typically, you use the Public Mailinator system when you need to give out an email address, but don't want to give your primary email address because you might get spammed. In those cases, make up a Mailinator email address on the fly (how about joe123@mailinator.com? Or, happybill@mailinator.com - use anything you want!). You can then come to the Mailinator website and check that inbox and read any email!

What Features do I get with a Subscription?

Mailinator offers subscriptions that allow businesses to do serious email testing. It's extremely convenient for testing environments to be able to create thousands of email addresses on the fly. Mailinator Subscriptions offer:

  • Complete privacy for all your emails.
  • Every email address at your Private Domain(s). That's Millions of email addresses ready to go! We'll give you your own Private Domain when you subscribe, but you can change it to a domain you own at any time.
  • WEB and API access to all inboxes, emails, and SMS messages
  • Optional private SMS numbers attached to your account for SMS testing
  • Persistent storage for your messages. Keep messages around as long as needed.
  • High rate-limits in both reading and receiving emails. Mailinator's public spam filters are turned off for Private Domains.
  • Webhook actions to take whenever an email is received. Forward it, auto-click its links, delete it, and more.
  • Setup User accounts for all your Team members.
  • Enterprise accounts can get Single-Sign-On (SSO) for extra security
How long do emails last in the Public and Private Mailinator systems?

Public emails (i.e. those sent to an address @mailinator.com) last several hours. After that point the system will auto-delete emails. Once that happens, they cannot be recovered.

Mailinator Subscriptions give users permanent first-in-first-out storage for their emails. Consequently, emails remain until the user deletes them (via Web or API) or when their storage space fills expunging old emails. Paid plans offer many levels of storage to accommodate any level of usage. In other words, Paid plans may keep their emails around indefinitely if they choose

Can I Send Email from Mailinator?

No. Mailinator is a Receive-Only system.

What are the limitations of the Public Mailinator System?

Here's some limitations of the Free system (note: they do not apply to Paid Mailinator Subscriptions)

  • All emails are Public. Any person can read anywhere. Do not expect Privacy.
  • Emails only last a few hours. After that point, they are deleted and unrecoverable.
  • You may not Send email from Mailinator. The system is receive-only.
  • Attachments are not allowed in the public system.
  • The Public system has certain limitations based on email size, rate-limiting, spam prevention, etc.
What is Mailinator's official Privacy Policy?

You may find Mailinator's official Privacy Policy by clicking here.

Does the public Mailinator system track my usage?

Mailinator does not keep logs of access to the website.

Any user may read any email without sign-up, passwords, or personal information. Mailinator does not store identifying information about user access (i.e., IP address). Mailinator has been this way for many years.

Note however - this is subject to change if compelled by law enforcement.

Also note - this statement is specific to the Mailinator public site (i.e., addresses at mailinator.com). It does not apply to private domains (paid subscribers).

So what data does the public Mailinator system keep?

Mailinator tracks real-time data to detect abuse of our website and bans abusers or specific emails when appropriate.

Several days of aggregate data that show website-usage trends is kept. No identifying information is present in this data.

Some emails are kept for spam analysis. This is far less than 1% of total email volume and may only extend an email's life to a few days. No email lives longer than that. Some data is kept around incoming email trends.

I want to know who owns a Mailinator email address!

Sorry, that question doesn't actually make sense. Public Mailinator email addresses (i.e. those ending in @mailinator.com) are not owned by anyone. There are no "accounts" in the public system (and no signup or login). All such email addresses are usable by anyone.