mail

(PHP 4, PHP 5, PHP 7, PHP 8)

mail — Envío de correo

Descripción

mail(
    string $to,
    string $subject,
    string $message,
    array|string $additional_headers = [],
    string $additional_params = ""
): bool

Envía un correo.

Parámetros

to

El o los destinatarios del correo.

El formato de esta cadena debe corresponder con la » RFC 2822. A continuación se muestran algunos ejemplos:

[email protected]
[email protected], [email protected]
Destinatario
Destinatario , Otro destinatario

subject

Asunto del correo a enviar.

Precaución

El asunto debe cumplir con la » RFC 2047.

message

Mensaje a enviar.

Cada línea debe estar separada por un carácter CRLF (\r\n). Las líneas no deben contener más de 70 caracteres.

Precaución

(Solo Windows) Cuando PHP se comunica directamente con un servidor SMTP, si se encuentra un punto al inicio de una línea, será eliminado. Para evitar este comportamiento, reemplace estas ocurrencias con dos puntos.

<?php
     $text = str_replace("\n.", "\n..", $text);
?>

additional_headers (opcional)

String o array a insertar al final de los encabezados del correo.

Este parámetro se utiliza típicamente para añadir encabezados adicionales (From, Cc y Bcc). Los encabezados adicionales deben estar separados por un carácter CRLF (\r\n). Si se utilizan datos externos para componer este encabezado, deben ser limpiados primero para evitar la inyección de datos no deseados en los encabezados.

Si se pasa un array, sus claves son los nombres de los encabezados y sus valores son los valores de los encabezados respectivos.

Nota:
Al enviar un correo, el correo debe contener un encabezado From. Puede ser definido por el parámetro additional_headers, o puede ser un valor predeterminado definido en el php.ini.

No hacerlo causará un mensaje de error similar a Warning: mail(): "sendmail_from" not set in php.ini or custom "From:" header missing. El encabezado From también define el encabezado Return-Path al enviar directamente vía SMTP (solo Windows).

Nota:
Si el mensaje no es recibido, intente utilizar únicamente un carácter LF (\n). Algunos agentes de transferencia de correo Unix (por ejemplo » qmail) reemplazan automáticamente el carácter LF por el carácter CRLF (lo que equivale a duplicar el carácter CR si se utiliza el carácter CRLF). Esto debe ser un último recurso ya que no cumple con la » RFC 2822.

additional_params (opcional)

El parámetro additional_params puede ser utilizado para pasar banderas adicionales como opciones a la línea de comandos configurada para ser utilizada para enviar los correos utilizando el parámetro de configuración sendmail_path. Por ejemplo, esto puede ser utilizado para definir la dirección del remitente del sobre al utilizar sendmail con la opción -f.

Este parámetro es escapado por la función escapeshellcmd() internamente para prevenir la ejecución de un comando. La función escapeshellcmd() previene la ejecución de un comando, pero permite añadir parámetros adicionales. Por razones de seguridad, se recomienda al usuario limpiar este parámetro para evitar añadir parámetros no deseados al comando shell.

Dado que la función escapeshellcmd() se aplica automáticamente, algunos caracteres permitidos en las direcciones de correo por las RFCs de internet ya no pueden ser utilizados. La función mail() no puede permitir estos caracteres, por lo tanto, en los programas donde su utilización es necesaria, debería utilizarse un método alternativo para el envío de correos (como el uso de un framework o una biblioteca.

El usuario bajo el cual se ejecuta el servidor web debe ser añadido como usuario de confianza en la configuración de sendmail para que el encabezado X-Warning no sea añadido al mensaje cuando el remitente del sobre (-f) es definido utilizando este método. Para los usuarios de sendmail, este archivo es /etc/mail/trusted-users.

Valores devueltos

Devuelve true si el correo ha sido aceptado para su entrega, false en caso contrario.

Es importante tener en cuenta que el hecho de que el correo haya sido aceptado para su entrega no garantiza que llegue a su destino.

Historial de cambios

Versión	Descripción
7.2.0	El parámetro `additional_headers` ahora acepta array.

Ejemplos

Ejemplo #1 Envío de un correo

Uso de la función mail() para enviar un correo simple:

<?php
// El mensaje
$message = "Line 1\r\nLine 2\r\nLine 3";

// En caso de que nuestras líneas contengan más de 70 caracteres, las cortamos utilizando wordwrap()
$message = wordwrap($message, 70, "\r\n");

// Envío del correo
mail('[email protected]', 'Mi Asunto', $message);
?>

Ejemplo #2 Envío de un correo con encabezados adicionales

Añadir encabezados simples, especificando al MUA las direcciones "From" y "Reply-To":

<?php
     $to      = '[email protected]';
     $subject = 'el asunto';
     $message = '¡Hola!';
     $headers = 'From: [email protected]' . "\r\n" .
     'Reply-To: [email protected]' . "\r\n" .
     'X-Mailer: PHP/' . phpversion();

     mail($to, $subject, $message, $headers);
 ?>

Ejemplo #3 Envío de un correo con un array de encabezados adicionales

Este ejemplo envía el mismo correo que el ejemplo anterior, pero pasa los encabezados adicionales como un array (disponible desde PHP 7.2.0).

<?php
$to      = '[email protected]';
$subject = 'el asunto';
$message = 'hola';
$headers = array(
    'From' => '[email protected]',
    'Reply-To' => '[email protected]',
    'X-Mailer' => 'PHP/' . phpversion()
);

mail($to, $subject, $message, $headers);
?>

Ejemplo #4 Envío de un correo con un parámetro adicional de línea de comandos

El parámetro additional_params puede ser utilizado para pasar un parámetro adicional al programa configurado para ser utilizado para enviar los correos utilizando sendmail_path.

<?php
     mail('[email protected]', 'el asunto', 'el mensaje', null,
     '[email protected]');
?>

Ejemplo #5 Envío de correo HTML

También es posible enviar correos HTML con la función mail().

<?php
     // Varios destinatarios
     $to  = '[email protected], [email protected]'; // note la coma

     // Asunto
     $subject = 'Calendario de cumpleaños para Agosto';

     // mensaje
     $message = '
     <html>
      <head>
       <title>Calendario de cumpleaños para Agosto</title>
      </head>
      <body>
       <p>¡Aquí están los cumpleaños que se avecinan en el mes de Agosto!</p>
       <table>
        <tr>
         <th>Persona</th><th>Día</th><th>Mes</th><th>Año</th>
        </tr>
        <tr>
         <td>Josiane</td><td>3</td><td>Agosto</td><td>1970</td>
        </tr>
        <tr>
         <td>Emma</td><td>26</td><td>Agosto</td><td>1973</td>
        </tr>
       </table>
      </body>
     </html>
     ';

     // Para enviar un correo HTML, el encabezado Content-type debe ser definido
     $headers[] = 'MIME-Version: 1.0';
     $headers[] = 'Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1';

     // Encabezados adicionales
     $headers[] = 'To: Mary <[email protected]>, Kelly <[email protected]>';
     $headers[] = 'From: Cumpleaños <[email protected]>';
     $headers[] = 'Cc: [email protected]';
     $headers[] = 'Bcc: [email protected]';

     // Envío
     mail($to, $subject, $message, implode("\r\n", $headers));
?>

Nota:
Si se planea enviar correos HTML u otros más complejos, se recomienda utilizar el paquete PEAR » PEAR::Mail_Mime.

Notas

Nota:
La implementación SMTP (solo en Windows) de la función mail() difiere significativamente de la implementación de sendmail. En primer lugar, no utiliza un programa local para componer los mensajes, sino que opera únicamente y directamente sobre los sockets, lo que significa que un MTA está necesariamente escuchando en un socket de red (que puede estar en la red local o en una máquina remota).

En segundo lugar, los encabezados personalizados como From:, Cc:, Bcc: y Date: no son interpretados por el MTA en primer lugar, sino que son analizados por PHP.

Además, el parámetro to no debe ser una dirección en el formato "Algo <[email protected]>". El comando mail no analizará correctamente esto al comunicarse con el MTA.

Nota:
Es importante tener en cuenta que la función mail() no está recomendada para manejar grandes volúmenes de correos en un bucle. Esta función abre y cierra un socket SMTP para cada correo, lo que no es muy eficiente.

Para enviar grandes volúmenes de correos, consulte los paquetes » PEAR::Mail y » PEAR::Mail_Queue.

Nota:
Las siguientes RFC pueden ser útiles: » RFC 1896, » RFC 2045, » RFC 2046, » RFC 2047, » RFC 2048, » RFC 2049 y » RFC 2822.

Ver también

mb_send_mail() - Envía un correo electrónico codificado
imap_mail() - Envía un mensaje de correo electrónico
» PEAR::Mail
» PEAR::Mail_Mime

Found A Problem?

Learn How To Improve This Page • Submit a Pull Request • Report a Bug

＋add a note

User Contributed Notes 17 notes

down

php at simoneast dot net ¶

8 years ago

Often it's helpful to find the exact error message that is triggered by the mail() function. While the function doesn't provide an error directly, you can use error_get_last() when mail() returns false.

<?php
$success = mail('[email protected]', 'My Subject', $message);
if (!$success) {
    $errorMessage = error_get_last()['message'];
}
?>

(Tested successfully on Windows which uses SMTP by default, but sendmail on Linux/OSX may not provide the same level of detail.)

Thanks to https://stackoverflow.com/a/20203870/195835

down

Anonymous ¶

8 years ago

Security advice: Although it is not documented, for the parameters $to and $subject the mail() function changes at least \r and \n to space. So these parameters are safe against injection of additional headers. But you might want to check $to for commas as these separate multiple addresses and you might not want to send to more than one recipient.

The crucial part is the $additional_headers parameter. This parameter can't be cleaned by the mail() function. So it is up to you to prevent unwanted \r or \n to be inserted into the values you put in there. Otherwise you just created a potential spam distributor.

down

Anonymous ¶

5 years ago

If you notice wrong displayed characters in the email it's because you need to properly set the Content-Type and the Charset in the headers of the email:

<?php
$headers = 'Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8' . "\r\n";
?>

Mostly, UTF-8 is your best choice.

You can set custom headers with the fourth parameter of the mail() function.

To make the whole thing waterproof, add the following header too:

<?php
$headers .= 'Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64' . "\r\n";
?>

Now you can use the combination of UTF-8 and Base64 to properly encode the subject line and the recipient name like this:

<?php
$subject = '=?UTF-8?B?' . base64_encode('Test email with German Umlauts öäüß') . '?=';
$recipient = '=?UTF-8?B?' . base64_encode('Margret Müller') . '?= <[email protected]>';
?>

And don't forget to Base64 encode the email message too:

<?php
$message = base64_encode('This email contains German Umlauts öäüß.');
?>

All references are taken from:
https://dev.to/lutvit/how-to-make-the-php-mail-function-awesome-3cii

down

priyanshkala3 at gmail dot com ¶

1 year ago

Sending mail using XAMPP server

I encountered numerous issues while attempting to send emails using the XAMPP server. However, I eventually found the correct method to accomplish it.

Configuring PHP's mail functionality to work with Gmail's SMTP server involves editing the `php.ini` and `sendmail.ini` configuration files. Below are the formal steps for setting up PHP to send emails through Gmail's SMTP server using XAMPP:

Configuring php.ini:

1. Open `php.ini` in an editor:
   Open the `php.ini` configuration file in your preferred text editor.

2. Locate the mail function:
   Use the search function (Ctrl + F) to find the section related to the mail function within the `php.ini` file.

3. Update mail function settings:
   Copy and paste the following configuration parameters into the mail function section. Comment out or disable all other settings related to mail.

   php.ini code to be edited:

   SMTP=smtp.gmail.com
   smtp_port=587
   sendmail_from = [email protected]
   sendmail_path = write_sendmail.exe_path
   

4. Save the changes:
   Save the `php.ini` file after applying the modifications.

Configuring sendmail.ini (in XAMPP folder):

1. Open `sendmail.ini` in XAMPP folder:
   Locate and open the `sendmail.ini` configuration file within the XAMPP directory.

2. Adjust SMTP settings:
   Insert the following content into the `sendmail.ini` file, marking other configurations as comments:

   sendmail.ini code :

   smtp_server=smtp.gmail.com
   smtp_port=587
   error_logfile=error.log
   debug_logfile=debug.log
   [email protected]
auth_password=app_password_after_enabling_two_factor_authentication_for_your_mail_id
   [email protected]
   

3. Save the changes:
   Save the `sendmail.ini` file after inserting the specified configurations.

These steps configure PHP to utilize Gmail's SMTP server for sending emails. Ensure that the modifications are saved and that the necessary XAMPP services are restarted for the changes to take effect.

Please note that using hardcoded passwords in configuration files poses a security risk. Storing passwords directly in plain text files should be avoided in production environments. Consider using environment variables or secure credential management systems for better security practices.

Code for sending mail-:

<?php
$subject = "Mail for checking";
$msg = "Hey! Let us play with PHP.";
$receiver = "[email protected]";
mail($receiver, $subject, $msg);
?>

down

chris at ocproducts dot com ¶

8 years ago

The 'sendmail' executable which PHP uses on Linux/Mac (not Windows) expects "\n" as a line separator.

This executable is a standard, and emulated by other MTAs.

"\n" is confirmed required for qmail and postfix, probably also for sendmail and exim but I have not tested.

If you pass through using "\r\n" as a separator it may appear to work, but your email will be subtly corrupted and some middleware may break. It only works because some systems will clean up your mistake.

If you are implementing DKIM be very careful, as DKIM checks will fail (at least on popular validation tools) if you screw this up. DKIM must be calculated using "\r\n" but then you must switch it all to "\n" when using the PHP mail function.

On Windows, however, you should use "\r\n" because PHP is using SMTP in this situation, and hence the normal rules of the SMTP protocol (not the normal rules of Unix piping) apply.

down

charles dot fisher at arconic dot com ¶

7 years ago

I migrated an application to a platform without a local transport agent (MTA). I did not want to configure an MTA, so I wrote this xxmail function to replace mail() with calls to a remote SMTP server. Hopefully it is of some use.

function xxmail($to, $subject, $body, $headers)
{
 $smtp = stream_socket_client('tcp://smtp.yourmail.com:25', $eno, $estr, 30);

 $B = 8192;
 $c = "\r\n";
 $s = '[email protected]';

 fwrite($smtp, 'helo ' . $_ENV['HOSTNAME'] . $c);
  $junk = fgets($smtp, $B);

 // Envelope
 fwrite($smtp, 'mail from: ' . $s . $c);
  $junk = fgets($smtp, $B);
 fwrite($smtp, 'rcpt to: ' . $to . $c);
  $junk = fgets($smtp, $B);
 fwrite($smtp, 'data' . $c);
  $junk = fgets($smtp, $B);

 // Header 
 fwrite($smtp, 'To: ' . $to . $c); 
 if(strlen($subject)) fwrite($smtp, 'Subject: ' . $subject . $c); 
 if(strlen($headers)) fwrite($smtp, $headers); // Must be \r\n (delimited)
 fwrite($smtp, $headers . $c); 

 // Body
 if(strlen($body)) fwrite($smtp, $body . $c); 
 fwrite($smtp, $c . '.' . $c);
  $junk = fgets($smtp, $B);

 // Close
 fwrite($smtp, 'quit' . $c);
  $junk = fgets($smtp, $B);
 fclose($smtp);
}

down

atesin > gmail ¶

2 years ago

mail() internals:

doing some tests i can say... if sendmail_path is defined in php.ini or by ini.set(), by calling function like...

mail($to, $subject, $message, $headers, $params)

would be like if php open a shell internally, execute this command, send this text to stdin, and return true if return value == 0

------------
shell> $sendmail_path $params
To: $to
Subject: $subject
$headers

$message
(EOF)
------------

in windows instead using php smtp which is very limited, i prefer to force use sendmail-like behavior, by setting sendmail_path and then use msmtp for windows

down

Porjo ¶

14 years ago

Make sure you enclose \r\n in double quotes (not single quotes!) so that PHP can translate that into the correct linefeed code

down

Mark Simon ¶

6 years ago

It is worth noting that you can set up a fake sendmail program using the sendmail_path directive in php.ini.

Despite the comment in that file, sendmail_path also works for Window. From https://www.php.net/manual/en/mail.configuration.php#ini.sendmail-path:

This directive works also under Windows. If set, smtp, smtp_port and sendmail_from are ignored and the specified command is executed.

down

Ben Cooke ¶

19 years ago

Note that there is a big difference between the behavior of this function on Windows systems vs. UNIX systems. On Windows it delivers directly to an SMTP server, while on a UNIX system it uses a local command to hand off to the system's own MTA.



The upshot of all this is that on a Windows system your  message and headers must use the standard line endings \r\n as prescribed by the email specs. On a UNIX system the MTA's "sendmail" interface assumes that recieved data will use UNIX line endings and will turn any \n to \r\n, so you must supply only \n to mail() on a UNIX system to avoid the MTA hypercorrecting to \r\r\n.



If you use plain old \n on a Windows system, some MTAs will get a little upset. qmail in particular will refuse outright to accept any message that has a lonely \n without an accompanying \r.

down

Anonymous ¶

2 years ago

So far I used the following to make sure special charakters where correctly shown in the mail subject:

<?php $subject = '=?utf-8?B?' . base64_encode($subject) . '?='; ?>

But with very long subjects, the header line gets longer than 76 chars and some e-mail servers really don't like that... So this is my new solution:

<?php $subject = substr(mb_encode_mimeheader("Subject: " . $subject, 'utf-8', 'B', "\r\n", 0), 9); ?>

Please note: I added "Subject: " in front of $subject and stripped it of afterwards. This is to make sure, that the necessarry space is reserved, as PHP will add the "Subject: " itself...

down

pangz dot lab at gmail dot com ¶

4 years ago

* Sending email with attachment

function sendMail(
    string $fileAttachment,
    string $mailMessage = MAIL_CONF["mailMessage"],
    string $subject     = MAIL_CONF["subject"],
    string $toAddress   = MAIL_CONF["toAddress"],
    string $fromMail    = MAIL_CONF["fromMail"]
): bool {
    
    $fileAttachment = trim($fileAttachment);
    $from           = $fromMail;
    $pathInfo       = pathinfo($fileAttachment);
    $attchmentName  = "attachment_".date("YmdHms").(
    (isset($pathInfo['extension']))? ".".$pathInfo['extension'] : ""
    );
    
    $attachment    = chunk_split(base64_encode(file_get_contents($fileAttachment)));
    $boundary      = "PHP-mixed-".md5(time());
    $boundWithPre  = "\n--".$boundary;
    
    $headers   = "From: $from";
    $headers  .= "\nReply-To: $from";
    $headers  .= "\nContent-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary=\"".$boundary."\"";
    
    $message   = $boundWithPre;
    $message  .= "\n Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8\n";
    $message  .= "\n $mailMessage";
    
    $message .= $boundWithPre;
    $message .= "\nContent-Type: application/octet-stream; name=\"".$attchmentName."\"";
    $message .= "\nContent-Transfer-Encoding: base64\n";
    $message .= "\nContent-Disposition: attachment\n";
    $message .= $attachment;
    $message .= $boundWithPre."--";
    
    return mail($toAddress, $subject, $message, $headers);
}

* Sending email in html

function sendHtmlMail(
    string $mailMessage = MAIL_CONF["mailMessage"],
    string $subject     = MAIL_CONF["subject"],
    array $toAddress    = MAIL_CONF["toAddress"],
    string $fromMail    = MAIL_CONF["fromMail"]
): bool {
    
    $to        = implode(",", $toAddress);
    $headers[] = 'MIME-Version: 1.0';
    $headers[] = 'Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1';    
    $headers[] = 'To: '.$to;
    $headers[] = 'From: '.$fromMail;    

    return mail($to, $subject, $mailMessage, implode("\r\n", $headers));
}

down

eeeugeneee ¶

7 years ago

Send mail with minimal requirements from email services.

<?php
    $encoding = "utf-8";

    // Preferences for Subject field
    $subject_preferences = array(
        "input-charset" => $encoding,
        "output-charset" => $encoding,
        "line-length" => 76,
        "line-break-chars" => "\r\n"
    );

    // Mail header
    $header = "Content-type: text/html; charset=".$encoding." \r\n";
    $header .= "From: ".$from_name." <".$from_mail."> \r\n";
    $header .= "MIME-Version: 1.0 \r\n";
    $header .= "Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit \r\n";
    $header .= "Date: ".date("r (T)")." \r\n";
    $header .= iconv_mime_encode("Subject", $mail_subject, $subject_preferences);

    // Send mail
    mail($mail_to, $mail_subject, $mail_message, $header);
?>

down

ABOMB ¶

13 years ago

I was having delivery issues from this function to Gmail, Yahoo, AOL, etc.  I used the notes here to figure that you need to be setting your Return-Path to a valid email to catch bounces.  There are two extra delivery gotchas on top of that:

1) The domain in the email used in the -f option in the php.ini sendmail parameter or in the mail() extra parameters field, needs to have a valid SPF record for the domain (in DNS as a "TXT" record type for sure and add an additional  "SPF" type record if possible).  Why? That's header field being used for spam checks.

2) You should also use a domain key or DKIM.  The trick here is that the domain key/DKIM is case sensitive!  I used Cpanel to create my domain key which automatically used all lowercase domain names in the key creation.  I found when  sending email and using a camel case "-f [email protected]" option, my key was not accepted.  However it was accepted when I used "-f [email protected]".

There are many other factors that can contribute to mail not getting to inboxes, including your own multiple failed testing attempts, so I suggest you consult each site's guidelines and don't ask me for help.  These are just the couple technical issues that helped my case.

I hope this saves someone some time and headaches...

down

-2

pavel.lint at vk.com ¶

13 years ago

Here's a small handy function I use to send email in UTF-8.

 <?php
function mail_utf8($to, $from_user, $from_email, 
                                             $subject = '(No subject)', $message = '')
   { 
      $from_user = "=?UTF-8?B?".base64_encode($from_user)."?=";
      $subject = "=?UTF-8?B?".base64_encode($subject)."?=";

      $headers = "From: $from_user <$from_email>\r\n". 
               "MIME-Version: 1.0" . "\r\n" . 
               "Content-type: text/html; charset=UTF-8" . "\r\n"; 

     return mail($to, $subject, $message, $headers); 
   }
?>

down

-3

rexlorenzo at gmail dot com ¶

13 years ago

Be careful to not put extra spaces for the $headers variable.

For example, this didn't work on our servers:

$headers = "From: $from \r\n Bcc: $bcc \r\n";

But this did:

$headers = "From: $from\r\nBcc: $bcc\r\n";

Notice the removal of the spaces around the first \r\n.

down

-3

andrew at my-syte dot com ¶

2 years ago

Regarding To: 

be careful not to duplicate To in the additional_headers, 

lest gmail already flags it thus:

host gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com [142.251.xx.xx]
SMTP error from remote mail server after end of data:
550-5.7.1 [xxx.xxx.xx.xx] This message is not RFC 5322 compliant, the issue is:
550-5.7.1 duplicate To headers. To reduce the amount of spam sent to Gmail,
550-5.7.1 this message has been blocked. Please review
550 5.7.1 RFC 5322 specifications for more information.

＋add a note