De-Mail Shutdown 2026: Dates, Data Deadline & Backup Steps

De-Mail (Deutschland-Mail), Germany’s government-regulated secure messaging service is scheduled to shut down on 31 December 2026. Thus for all @.de-mail.de accounts used German citizens, companies, law firms, & public agencies will be decommissioned i.e. can no longer support sending or receiving emails and will be available only as read-only mailboxes for 3 months in early 2027. 

De-Mail Closure 2026: Key Facts and User Actions At Glance 

1. What ends? De-Mail service of the last provider (FP-DBS) and the De-Mail Act
2. What is the last operational date? 31 December 2026
3. Can I still read my mailbox afterwards? Yes till first 3 months of 2027
4. Is it possible to open a new account? No
5. What should you do? Forward or export your De-Mail emails with attachments to avoid losing access.
6. What Replaces De-Mail? There is no single official alternative to De-mail. Public/Personal: BundID, eBO & beBPo; For Businesses: EU eIDAS services

Backing up your other email accounts with BitRecover

BitRecover cannot back up a De-Mail mailbox. The BitRecover Email Backup Wizard works with mail services that mail software can connect to, such as Gmail, Microsoft 365, Yahoo and IMAP servers, and De-Mail is not one of them. If you are leaving De-Mail, it can still help with the regular email accounts you keep, saving them to PST, MBOX, EML, PDF and other formats. BitRecover 1&1 Mail Backup Tool. 

De-Mail Termination: Official Date & Support Timeline 

• 3 May 2011: Enforcement of De-Mail Act
• 2012: Accredited providers like Deutsche Telekom, 1 & 1, and FP-DBS begin offering De-Mail services.
• 2022: Deutsche Telekom ends its De-Mail service.31 August 2024: German federal administration ends its De-Mail usage
• 2024: 1&1 group (1&1, GMX, and WEB.DE) discontinue its De-Mail service.
• 30 June 2025: German Pension Insurance officially stops communicating via De-Mail.
• May 2026: German Bundestag repeal the De-Mail Act.31
• December 2026: FP-DBS - only last remaining De-Mail provider stops operating De-Mail, and the De-Mail Act expires.
• 1 January 2027: Read-only mailbox access begins.
• End of March 2027: Read-only access ends after

How to save your messages from the FP-DBS portal

The FP-DBS portal is the only place a De-Mail mailbox can be read, so the backup is done there, by hand. FP-DBS's portal overview states that reading and creating De-Mails is possible only inside the portal.

1. Sign in to the FP-DBS De-Mail portal at www.fp-demail.de. Some actions need a second sign-in step ("hoch anmelden") with a TAN sent to your mobile number.
2. Open a folder, then open each message.
3. Save the message and each attachment to your computer with the portal's download option. [FP-DBS PORTAL: confirm the exact button label and the file format it produces.]
4. Create one local folder for each De-Mail folder and save into it, so the structure survives.
5. Save the sent and received confirmations together with the message they belong to.
6. Open a sample of the saved files to confirm they read correctly, and compare message counts per folder.
7. Keep two copies on separate storage.

Business accounts with several users have a separate mailbox per user, so repeat the steps for each one, signed in as that user.

Can you export De-Mail to PST, EML or MBOX?

Not directly. Backup and conversion software cannot read a De-Mail mailbox, so there is no one-click route to PST, EML or MBOX. What you can keep is whatever the portal lets you download, so check the file type it gives you before you plan an archive around it.