Exim cheat sheet – Commands for troubleshoot mail issues in cPanel/DirectAdmin or any exim mail server

Below are the most common exim commands which helps an Administrator to ease his life

Print a count of the messages in the queue:

exim -bpc

Print a listing of the messages in the queue (time queued, size, message-id, sender, recipient):

exim -bp

Print a summary of messages in the queue (count, volume, oldest, newest, domain, and total

exim -bp| exiqsumm

Print what Exim is doing right now:

exiwhat

To check if the server routes the mail properly use exim -bt

# exim -bt alias@localdomain.com
user@thishost.com
    <-- alias@localdomain.com
  router = localuser, transport = local_delivery
root@localhost# exim -bt user@thishost.com
user@thishost.com
  router = localuser, transport = local_delivery
root@localhost# exim -bt user@remotehost.com
  router = lookuphost, transport = remote_smtp
  host mail.remotehost.com [1.2.3.4] MX=0

Display all of Exim’s configuration settings:

exim -bp

exiqgrep

Its used for grepping through the  exim queue.

search the queue for messages from a specific sender :

exigrep -f  user@domainname.com

Search the queue for a specific reciepient

exigrep -r user@domainname.com

To print messages older than the specified number of seconds use -o .

For example, messages older than 1 day:

exigrep -o 86400

To print messages younger than specified number of seconds use -y

Messages younger than one day can be listed  using the command

exigrep -y 86400

Print just the message-id of the entire queue:

exiqgrep -i

Managing the queue

Start a queue run:

exim -q -v

Start a queue run for just local deliveries:

exim -ql  -v

Remove a message from the queue:

exim -Mrm <message id >

Freeze a message:

exim -Mf <message id >

Thaw a message:

exim -Mt <message id>

Deliver a message, whether it’s frozen or not, whether the retry time has been reached or not:

exim -M <message id>

Deliver a message, but only if the retry time has been reached:

exim -Mc <message_id>

Force a message to  Freeze and bounce as “Canceled by Admin”

exim -Mg <message id>

Remove all frozen mails

exigrep -z -i | xargs exim -Mrm

Remove all messages older than five days (86400 * 5 = 432000 seconds):

exigrep -o 432000 -i | xargs exim -Mrm

Freeze all queued mail from a given sender

exiqgrep -i -f user@domain.com | xargs exim -Mf

View a message’s headers:

exim -Mvh <messageid>

View a message’s body:

exim -Mvb <message id>

View a message’s logs:

exim -Mvl <message id>

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