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Papercut SMTP vs MailCatcher: catalog facts
Papercut SMTPMailCatcher
Free

Free and open source under the Apache-2.0 licence.

Free

Free and open source under the MIT License.

Windows, Self-hosted macOS, Linux, Web, Command line
  • Catches test emails without sending them
  • Simple desktop interface for reading captured messages
  • Captures email locally for development
  • Shows HTML, plain text, and source views
  • Meant for testing, not a real mail server
  • Desktop app is Windows-only
  • Requires Ruby 3.3 or newer
  • Email encoding support is incomplete
Downloadable app, Self-hosted Downloadable app, Web application
Open source Open source
License: Apache-2.0 License: MIT
No account needed Not stated if an account is needed
Works offline Not stated if it works offline

Checked October 2, 2026

Checked October 8, 2026

Catalog facts only. Anything “not stated” is unconfirmed. Check full listings for details.