How to Use Roundcube Webmail: The Features Worth Knowing

Roundcube is the webmail screen you land on after clicking "Webmail" in cPanel, Plesk, or DirectAdmin. It is not its own hosting service — it is open-source software (roundcube.net) that hosting companies install on top of the mail server they already run, so the login screen, the folder list, and the compose window all belong to Roundcube even though the mailbox itself lives on your host's IMAP server.

That distinction matters for what you can and can't fix here. Roundcube controls how mail is displayed and organized. It does not control spam filtering, storage quotas, or whether your host's mail server is reachable — those are server-side settings, usually reachable from a different tab in your hosting panel.

Before you start: what you need and what you don't#

You need three things: the webmail URL your host gave you (often yourdomain.com/webmail or a port-specific address), the full email address as the username, and the mailbox password — not your hosting-panel password, which is frequently different.

You do not need to install anything. Roundcube runs entirely in the browser, which is also why performance depends partly on your host's server load rather than your device.

Any modern browser works — Roundcube doesn't require a specific one, though the Elastic skin renders best in something updated in the last couple of years. Bookmark the login URL once you have it; hosting panels rarely surface it a second time, and "yourdomain.com/webmail" is not always a correct guess if your host uses a custom subdomain or a non-standard port.

• Full email address (not just the local part before the @)
• Mailbox password from your host's email-accounts screen
• The webmail login URL — check your welcome email or hosting panel if unsure

How to set up an identity in Roundcube#

An identity is the name and reply-to address attached to mail you send — separate from the mailbox you're logged into. Most people never touch this until they need a second "From" name, like a support alias sent from the same inbox.

Go to Settings (gear icon) > Identities > the plus button. Fill in display name, email address, and optionally a reply-to address and a signature. Save, and it appears in the From dropdown next time you compose.

1. 1

   Open Settings > Identities

   The gear icon is usually bottom-left or top-right depending on the skin your host uses.

2. 2

   Add a new identity

   Click the plus/add button and fill in display name, email, and optional reply-to.

3. 3

   Set a default

   One identity is marked default and pre-selected on new messages; you switch the rest from the compose window's From field.

4. 4

   Add a signature

   Plain text or HTML, per identity — useful if one alias needs different sign-off wording than another.

How to set up filters with the managesieve plugin#

Roundcube's filter UI is a plugin called managesieve, and whether you see it depends on your host — most cPanel and Plesk installs enable it by default, but some minimal installs don't. If Settings has no "Filters" entry, your host hasn't turned it on, and there's no client-side workaround; it has to be enabled server-side.

When it's available, filters live under Settings > Filters. Each rule is a condition (sender, subject, size) and an action (move to folder, mark as read, forward, discard). The important part: these rules run on the mail server via the Sieve language, not inside Roundcube — so they still fire on mail that arrives while you're logged out or checking a different client entirely.

Does Roundcube have a spam filter?#

No — not built in. Spam scoring and blocking happen on the mail server, typically via SpamAssassin configured by your hosting provider, before mail ever reaches Roundcube. What Roundcube contributes is a Junk folder to show the results and, on hosts that enable the markasjunk plugin, a "Mark as Junk" button that reports the message back to the spam filter to improve its scoring.

If spam is getting through, the fix is in your hosting panel's mail settings (SpamAssassin sensitivity, a blocklist) — not anywhere in Roundcube's own settings menu.

A related question worth asking your host separately: whether SpamAssassin is set to tag-and-deliver or to reject outright. Tag-and-deliver drops flagged mail into Junk where you can still find a false positive; a hard reject at the server never reaches any folder, so a missing message you're sure was sent is worth a check against your host's mail logs before assuming Roundcube lost it.

How to manage folder subscriptions#

IMAP mailboxes can hold folders you never subscribed to — a server-created Archive or a shared folder a host provisions by default. Roundcube only shows folders you've subscribed to in the sidebar, and Settings > Folders is where that list is managed.

This is also where you create new folders, rename them, and set per-folder options like whether a folder counts toward unread badges.

• Settings > Folders lists every folder the server knows about, subscribed or not
• Checking a folder subscribes it — it appears in the sidebar immediately
• Deleting a folder here deletes it on the server for every client connected to that mailbox

How to manage contacts in Roundcube#

The Contacts icon (usually next to Settings, not inside it) opens Roundcube's address book — a separate area from Settings because it's data you own rather than a preference you're configuring. It stores name, email, phone, and organization fields per contact, plus free-form notes.

Contacts can be organized into groups, which matters for one thing beyond tidiness: composing to a group address list. Type a group name in the To field and Roundcube expands it to every member, which is the closest thing Roundcube has to a built-in mailing list.

Most installs also support import and export as vCard (.vcf), which is how you move contacts between Roundcube and a desktop client, a phone, or a different webmail provider without retyping every entry. Look for Import/Export buttons at the bottom of the Contacts sidebar.

• Contacts > plus button adds a new entry manually
• Import/Export at the bottom of the Contacts panel handles vCard files
• Groups let you address a whole list by typing one group name in To

Roundcube across skins and hosting panels: what differs#

What the Settings screen is actually organizing#

Every setting covered above — identities, filters, folder subscriptions, the markasjunk toggle — lives inside the same Settings area, just under different tabs. It's worth opening each tab once after your first login so you know what's configurable before you need it mid-task.

The layout below is the Elastic skin's default arrangement, which is what most cPanel, Plesk, and DirectAdmin installs ship. A self-hosted or older install may reorder these tabs or use the legacy Larry skin, but the underlying options are the same ones this guide covers.

Roundcube keyboard shortcuts: what actually exists#

Roundcube's shortcut set is smaller than Gmail's and mostly lives inside the compose window: Ctrl/Cmd+Enter sends, Esc closes without sending, and arrow keys move focus between the message list and the read pane. There isn't an official single-key scheme for archive, delete, or reply the way Gmail has j/k/e/r baked in.

If your host's Roundcube install has a shortcuts plugin enabled, more bindings may appear — but that's a per-install addition, not something guaranteed by the base product. Check Settings for a "Keyboard shortcuts" help panel to see what your specific instance actually supports before assuming a shortcut exists.

What to do when Roundcube doesn't work#

Most Roundcube problems are login or connectivity issues, not bugs in the software itself, because the client is just a window onto a server it doesn't control.

Before escalating to your host's support queue, two low-effort checks catch a surprising share of issues: a hard refresh (clearing a cached, half-loaded version of the interface after a host-side update) and trying a different browser or a private/incognito window (ruling out a browser extension — ad blockers and some password managers occasionally interfere with Roundcube's compose window).

A faster way to run mail that lives on a Roundcube-hosted account#

Roundcube gives you filters and a Junk folder, but every rule still has to be written by hand, and there's no layer above it deciding what actually deserves your attention today versus what can wait. AI Emaily connects to the same IMAP mailbox your Roundcube login points to and adds triage, drafting, and follow-up handling on top — the manual filter setup above still works underneath it, it's just no longer the whole system.

In Copilot mode, nothing sends without your approval, and every action is logged and reversible. We build AI Emaily, and it's not a Roundcube replacement so much as what runs alongside a hosting-panel mailbox once you're tired of writing Sieve rules for every new sender pattern. Start a 7-day free trial at app.aiemaily.com — card required, $0 if you cancel before day 7.