Why I Moved Away from CyberPanel for Email Hosting

Hey, I’m Jiyasrul Alom Juwel. I’m super into backend stuff — email servers, server management, automation, and all the good nerdy backend vibes. I love tinkering with servers, and I’ve spent countless sleepless nights building, breaking, and fixing them. Recently, I made a big decision: I moved away from CyberPanel for my email hosting setup. And yep, I’ve got some strong reasons why I ditched it, despite it being a pretty solid panel in many areas.

In this post, I’m going to go deep into why I made that call. If you’re someone trying to figure out whether CyberPanel is the right fit for your email hosting or not, then buckle up — because I’m spilling all the beans here.

My Initial Journey with CyberPanel (and Why It Looked So Promising)

I’ll be honest: my first impression of CyberPanel was actually pretty good.

• It was super easy to install. Like, literally one-liner install and boom — you’re inside a clean, minimal, but powerful admin panel.
• The UI? Loved it. It’s clean, not bloated, and gives off that “simple but gets the job done” vibe.

And for someone like me who manages multiple websites and wants full control over the email stack, CyberPanel felt like a dream at first glance. Setting up email accounts was a breeze. There’s even a resource monitor that gives you a live view of your VPS/server’s CPU, RAM, and disk usage — which I personally think is underrated and incredibly useful when managing multiple processes.

The Cracks Start to Show: My Issues with CyberPanel

So yeah, while the honeymoon phase was great, once I got deeper into using CyberPanel for actual production email hosting, things started to fall apart for me.

Let’s break it down into real-world issues I personally faced:

1. The API Mystery: Missing, Hidden, or Just Broken?

I’m huge on automation. When you’re hosting email services for clients or your own systems, you don’t want to manually click through a panel every time you need to create or delete an email account.

CyberPanel claims to offer an API for managing email accounts. And sure, technically it does. But here’s the kicker: I couldn’t find it.

I searched everywhere in the docs. Read through multiple forums, GitHub issues, Reddit threads, everything. Nothing. There’s no clear documentation on how to get the API key or even what the endpoints are. That’s a major red flag when you’re trying to scale or automate your operations.

And if something as basic as “create an email account through API” is undocumented or half-baked, that just kills the vibe for me. I want transparency and support, especially from software that’s managing a core part of my infrastructure.

2. Bugs. And More Bugs.

This part drove me nuts.

Sometimes, emails wouldn’t send. Not because of DNS issues or external errors, but because CyberPanel just… didn’t send them. Sometimes the mail queue would delay for no reason. Sometimes emails would sit there like lazy bums, and I’d get messages from clients saying, “Hey, I didn’t get your email.”

When you’re running something serious, this isn’t just an inconvenience. It’s a straight-up risk.

And let’s not forget the logs. Debugging email issues with CyberPanel isn’t smooth. Logs are scattered and don’t always give you actionable info. A few times, I had to SSH into the server and manually poke around Postfix and Dovecot just to figure out what happened.

3. Bloat Features That Waste Resources

Here’s something not a lot of people talk about: CyberPanel comes with a bunch of features that are just not useful for everyone.

If you’re like me and you want a lean VPS setup, CyberPanel’s resource usage can get annoying. It eats up more memory than I expected for something that’s supposed to be lightweight.

Sure, I loved the live resource monitor. But when I looked at my server’s memory consumption after installing CyberPanel, it didn’t sit right. My 2GB VPS started sweating a little too quickly.

So if your use-case is ONLY email and you want it optimized to the bone, CyberPanel is just a little too chunky.

4. Lack of Community and Support Resources

This is a biggie for me. When I hit a wall, I want to be able to quickly search a doc or post a question and get real help.

But with CyberPanel? The community is not as active as some of the other panels out there. The docs are okay-ish, but for anything advanced or API-related? Nope. Just a desert. I felt alone and unsupported.

And honestly, for something like an email server — where blacklisting, DNS configs, and spam issues are already complicated enough — lack of documentation just makes it worse.

Comparing CyberPanel With Other Panels I’ve Tried

Here’s a quick overview of how CyberPanel stacks up against some other panels I tested after ditching it:

Mailcow eventually became my go-to. It’s a bit more complex to set up, but it offers everything I was looking for. Especially the well-documented API and consistent mail delivery.

The Stuff I Still Like About CyberPanel

Let me be clear. CyberPanel isn’t trash. It’s actually great in some ways. I still think it’s:

• Fantastic for beginners setting up web hosting and email for the first time.
• Visually appealing. The admin panel design? 10/10.
• The live resource monitor is underrated gold.

But when you grow past beginner level and need production-grade email reliability and automation, CyberPanel just doesn’t hold up.

My Final Thoughts: Should You Use CyberPanel for Email Hosting?

Here’s what I’d say if you’re reading this and still unsure:

• If you’re just starting out, and you want a quick and easy way to host emails, go for it. CyberPanel is one of the best beginner-friendly panels out there.
• If your email setup is critical, and you need automation, reliability, and proper documentation, look elsewhere.

I still respect what CyberPanel is doing. And I hope they keep improving it. But for me? I outgrew it.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Is CyberPanel good for production-level email hosting?

It depends. For small setups, it’s okay. But if you need high reliability and automation, it falls short.

Can I use the CyberPanel API to manage emails?

Theoretically yes, but practically no. The documentation is vague or missing. You won’t get a reliable experience if you depend on APIs.

Is CyberPanel heavy on server resources?

Yes, especially if you’re on a low-RAM VPS. It uses more resources than you’d expect from a “lightweight” panel.

What’s a better alternative to CyberPanel for email hosting?

Mailcow is my current favorite. It’s rock solid, very well documented, and has a clean API setup.

Wrapping It Up

So yeah, that’s the full story of why I moved away from CyberPanel. It wasn’t a rage quit. It was more like growing pains. CyberPanel is cool, but not built for the kind of setup I needed.

Thanks for sticking through this long post. I hope this gave you real, practical insights. If you’re building your own mail server and love nerding out like me, feel free to reach out. Maybe we can break some stuff together 😉

Stay curious, stay backend-y.

— Jiyasrul Alom Juwel