mcp-email-index 0.1.6

Standalone MCP server that indexes IMAP email accounts for semantic and structured search

mcp-email-index

Indexes your IMAP email locally so you can search it fast — both semantically ("that email about the project deadline from last month") and structurally ("all emails from [e-mail] in March 2024"). Full email bodies and attachments are fetched live from IMAP on demand; only metadata and embeddings are stored locally.

Works with any IMAP mailbox (Gmail, self-hosted, etc.). Supports multiple accounts searched together or independently.

Requires Python 3.10+. Uses Qdrant (embedded) for vector search, SQLite with FTS5 for structured search, and sentence-transformers for embeddings.

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Quick Start

1. Configure

Edit ~/.mcp-email-index/config.toml (auto-created on first run):

[account.work]
imap_host         = "mail.example-corp.com"
imap_port         = 993
imap_ssl          = true
imap_verify_ssl   = true                                 # set false for self-signed certs
username          = "[e-mail]"
password          = "..."
max_connections   = 10                                   # max concurrent IMAP connections
# default_from    = "Alice <[e-mail]>"     # backfill empty From headers
# exclude_folders = ["[Gmail]/All Mail", "[Gmail]/Spam"] # glob patterns for folders to skip
# smime_pfx       = "~/.mcp-email-index/certs/work.pfx" # S/MIME decryption certificate
# smime_password  = "..."                                # or env MCP_EMAIL_INDEX_WORK_SMIME_PASSWORD

[account.personal]
imap_host         = "imap.example-personal.com"
imap_port         = 993
imap_ssl          = true
imap_verify_ssl   = true
username          = "[e-mail]"
password          = "..."

Add as many [account.<name>] sections as you need. The <name> is what you use in --account flags and MCP tool parameters.

Passwords can also be set via environment variables: MCP_EMAIL_INDEX_<ACCOUNT>_PASSWORD (uppercase account name) takes priority over the config file value. Same pattern for S/MIME: MCP_EMAIL_INDEX_<ACCOUNT>_SMIME_PASSWORD.

2. Add to your MCP client

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "email-index": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": ["mcp-email-index"]
    }
  }
}

Multiple clients can use the same config — the first one starts the daemon, the rest connect to it. When the last client disconnects, the daemon auto-shuts down after 60 seconds (MCP_EMAIL_INDEX_GRACE env var to override).

3. Index your email

email index

This starts the server (if not already running) and indexes all configured accounts. Run it once after setup, then periodically to pick up new mail.

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CLI Commands

All commands use uvx --from mcp-email-index mcp-email-index-cli. Tip — add an alias to ~/.zshrc:

alias email='uvx --from mcp-email-index mcp-email-index-cli'

Then: email index, email stop, email scan, etc.

The server is started automatically when needed.

serve — Start the server

email serve

Daemonizes on Unix, writes PID to ~/.mcp-email-index/server.pid, logs to ~/.mcp-email-index/server.log, and waits until the server is ready before exiting.

The server auto-shuts down when idle. You don't normally need to call serve manually — the MCP shim starts it automatically.

stop — Shut down the server

email stop

If an indexing job is running, it is cancelled (progress saved) before shutdown.

index — Build or update the index

# Incremental — only new emails since last run
email index

# Specific accounts
email index --account work
email index --account work --account personal

# Specific folders (suffix-wildcard glob, only trailing * supported)
email index --account work --folder "Archive/2025/*"

# Full reindex — wipes existing data and rebuilds from scratch
email index --full
email index --full --account work --folder "Archive/2025/2025-03"

Flag	What it does
--account NAME / -a	Restrict to this account. Repeat for multiple. Omit for all.
--folder GLOB / -f	Restrict to folders matching this glob. Only trailing * wildcard. Requires exactly one --account.
--full	Delete existing index data first, then reindex. Required when the embedding model changes.

The CLI shows the live progress stream after starting the job. Press Ctrl-C to choose: run in background (default) or cancel the job.

During indexing the server automatically:

• Detects and prunes emails deleted from IMAP (stale UIDs)
• Removes folders that no longer exist on IMAP or are now in exclude_folders
• Leaves other already-indexed folders untouched when using --folder to scope a run
• Validates the embedding model fingerprint — blocks incremental indexing if the model changed (use --full to confirm)

index cancel — Stop the current indexing job

email index cancel

Finishes the current batch, saves progress, and stops. No data is lost.

index remove — Remove indexed data

email index remove -a work -f "Archive/2024/2024-03"  # specific folder
email index remove -a work                            # entire account
email index remove                                    # everything

Prompts for confirmation before deleting.

scan — Discover new and removed folders

email scan

Compares live IMAP folder lists against the index. Removes stale folders from the index and shows an ASCII tree of all folders with their index status, including counts of new (unindexed) messages.

status — Live indexing progress

email status

Streams a live progress display while an indexing job is running. Press Ctrl-C to exit — the job keeps running.

Command interactions

Situation	What happens
index while a job is running	Shows the running job's status. Cancel first to start a new one.
scan while a job is running	Rejected — cancel the job first.
stop while a job is running	Cancels the job (progress saved), then shuts down.
serve while server is already running	Detects existing process, exits with a message.

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MCP Tools

These tools are exposed to MCP clients. All search tools query across all configured accounts by default.

search_emails — Semantic search

Natural language search across email subjects and bodies.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
query	string	required	Natural language query
accounts	list[string]	[] (all)	Restrict to specific accounts
n_results	int	10	Number of results
since	string | null	null	ISO date lower bound
before	string | null	null	ISO date upper bound
folder_glob	string | null	null	Folder path glob (trailing * only)
from_addr	string | null	null	Sender substring
to_addr	string | null	null	To/CC recipient substring
has_attachment	bool | null	null	Filter by attachment presence
overfetch	int	5	Candidate multiplier for address filters

find_emails — Structured search

Field-specific lookups with FTS5 keyword search. Supports pagination.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
accounts	list[string]	[] (all)	Restrict to specific accounts
from_addr	string | null	null	Sender substring
to_addr	string | null	null	To/CC recipient substring
subject	string | null	null	Subject keyword search (FTS5)
body	string | null	null	Body preview keyword search (FTS5)
since	string | null	null	ISO date lower bound
before	string | null	null	ISO date upper bound
folder_glob	string | null	null	Folder path glob
has_attachment	bool | null	null	Filter by attachment presence
limit	int	50	Page size (capped at max_find_results)
offset	int	0	Pagination offset

get_email — Fetch full email content

Fetches the complete email body live from IMAP.

Parameter	Type	Description
account	string	Account name
folder	string	IMAP folder path
uid	string	IMAP UID

Returns full plain-text body (HTML stripped if no text/plain part), headers, and attachment filenames. If the email has been moved to a different folder on the server, the index is updated automatically. If the email no longer exists on IMAP, it is pruned from the index.

get_metadata_by_message_id — Look up by Message-ID

Instant lookup from the local index — no IMAP connection needed.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
message_id	string	required	RFC 2822 Message-ID
accounts	list[string]	[] (all)	Restrict to specific accounts

get_thread — Reconstruct email thread

Returns all indexed emails in the same conversation, sorted by date ascending. Thread reconstruction uses In-Reply-To and References headers.

Parameter	Type	Description
account	string	Account name
message_id	string	Message-ID of any email in the thread

save_attachments — Download attachments

Fetches the email live from IMAP and saves attachments to a local directory. Handles filename collisions by appending a counter.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
account	string	required	Account name
folder	string	required	IMAP folder path
uid	string	required	IMAP UID
dest_dir	string	"."	Local path to save into (auto-created if needed)
names	list[string]	[] (all)	Specific filenames to save; empty means all

list_folders — See what's indexed

Lists all indexed folders with email counts and last indexing timestamp.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
account	string | null	null	Specific account, or null for all

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Search Tips

• search_emails for natural language: "that email about the project deadline".
• find_emails for precise lookups: exact sender, date range, subject keywords.
• folder_glob narrows scope: "Archive/2024/*" searches only 2024 folders.
• from_addr and to_addr are substring matches — "bob" matches [e-mail].
• get_thread after finding an interesting email to see the full conversation.

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S/MIME Support

If your IMAP server stores S/MIME encrypted or signed emails (common with Exchange), configure a PFX/P12 certificate for transparent decryption:

[account.work]
smime_pfx      = "~/.mcp-email-index/certs/work.pfx"
smime_password = "pfx-password"

The PFX can contain multiple key+cert pairs (e.g. current + historical). All pairs are tried during decryption. OpenSSL is used as a fallback for BER-encoded PKCS7 and legacy algorithms (RC2, DES).

Handled formats:

• Standard S/MIME enveloped-data (encrypted)
• Opaque-signed messages (signature unwrapped to extract body)
• Detached signatures (multipart with text + pkcs7 signature)
• Exchange "Microsoft Mail Internet Headers" wrapper
• Exchange TNEF-wrapped S/MIME (application/ms-tnef with PKCS7 body)
• Apple Mail S/MIME (missing Content-Type, only filename=smime.p7m)

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Account Options

default_from — Backfill empty From headers

Old Exchange Sent folders sometimes store emails with an empty From header. Set default_from to backfill it during indexing and live fetches:

[account.work]
default_from = "Your Name <[e-mail]>"

exclude_folders — Skip folders during indexing

Glob patterns for folders to exclude from indexing and scanning:

[account.work]
exclude_folders = ["[Gmail]/All Mail", "[Gmail]/Spam", "Drafts"]

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Configuration Reference

~/.mcp-email-index/config.toml:

Section	Key	Default	Description
[account.<name>]	imap_host	—	IMAP server hostname
	imap_port	993	IMAP port
	imap_ssl	true	Use SSL
	imap_verify_ssl	true	Verify SSL certs (set false for self-signed)
	username	—	IMAP username
	password	—	IMAP password (or env MCP_EMAIL_INDEX_<NAME>_PASSWORD)
	max_connections	10	Max concurrent IMAP connections
	default_from	—	Backfill empty From headers (e.g. "Name <email>")
	exclude_folders	—	List of glob patterns for folders to skip
	smime_pfx	—	Path to PFX/P12 certificate for S/MIME decryption
	smime_password	—	PFX password (or env MCP_EMAIL_INDEX_<NAME>_SMIME_PASSWORD)
[index]	data_dir	~/.mcp-email-index/data	Where index data is stored (Qdrant + SQLite)
	embedding_model	nomic-ai/nomic-embed-text-v1.5	Sentence-transformers model (changing requires --full reindex)
	batch_size	50	Emails per IMAP fetch batch
	max_find_results	500	Hard cap on find_emails results
	preview_chars	500	Body preview length stored in index
	embed_chars	8000	Body text fed to embedding model (must be ≥ preview_chars)
[server]	host	127.0.0.1	Bind address
	port	6644	HTTP port for MCP (SSE) and CLI
	log_level	INFO	DEBUG | INFO | WARNING | ERROR
	semaphore_timeout_s	30	Timeout (seconds) waiting for IMAP connection slot

Server files:

• PID file: ~/.mcp-email-index/server.pid
• Log file: ~/.mcp-email-index/server.log
• Config: ~/.mcp-email-index/config.toml (auto-created with defaults on first run, chmod 600)