Mail() not working, any ideas why?

Question

Hi guys i am using the mail() from the contact form and for some reason it is not working.

The php coding i have setup is as follows:

            // sending email to sales@xxx.com
        $to      = "hello@xxx.com";
        $subject = 'Email From {$name} from your website';
        $message = "$name has contacted you from the website and says:

        $mcontent

        $name 's contact email address is: $email"; 

        $headers = $email . "\r\n";
        $headers .= "Reply-To: " . $email . "\r\n"; 
        $headers .= "Content-type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1\r\n"; 

        mail($to, $subject, $message, $headers) or die ("Failure");
        // end of sending mail

        returnheader("/xxx/email-sent");

i get no errors at all, it even goes to the success page when completed.

Any ideas why this would not work.

[`error_reporting()`](http://il2.php.net/manual/en/function.error-reporting.php) — Madara's Ghost, Feb 14 '12 at 12:07
@Jleagle the email is the email that is submitted in the contact form, as i say i have tested and no errors are submitted — Robert, Feb 14 '12 at 12:08
So many duplicates http://stackoverflow.com/search?q=php+mail — Mike B, Feb 14 '12 at 13:34

score 2 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:27

2

I have checked your code and it is working fine on my server , i am getting e-mail. Here , it looks like some problem with your SMTP server settings. There is nothing wrong with your PHP script. You can find your solution here. php.ini & SMTP= - how do you pass username & password

Also in windows environment , http://www.ruhanirabin.com/php-sendmail-setup-with-smtp-iis-and-windows-servers/

edited May 23 '17 at 12:27

Community

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answered Feb 14 '12 at 12:15

Milap

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Thank you, i am looking into phpmailer to send smtp direct. – Robert Feb 15 '12 at 08:59

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 14 '12 at 12:05

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If you are on WIndows, make sure you have an SMTP server in your php.ini
If you are una Unix, make sure the MTA is running: If it is (at least partly) installed but not runnng, you will get exactly this effect

Edit

If your MTA is not running, and you start it, the mails sent with PHP will go out! They have beein queued, but not processed.

answered Feb 14 '12 at 12:05

Eugen Rieck

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Depends on the OS - which one do you use? – Eugen Rieck Feb 14 '12 at 12:07

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Feb 14 '12 at 12:06

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This is probably related to the mail setup. Do you have a mailserver running on the machine? Check sendmail / smtp_server settings in php.ini.

answered Feb 14 '12 at 12:06

Eirik Hoem

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there is no smtp options within the php.ini file – Robert Feb 14 '12 at 14:35
Would be for win32, but seems like that is not the case then. – Eirik Hoem Feb 18 '12 at 09:58

score 1 · Answer 4 · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

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mail() uses the sendmail, by default: sendmail -t -i

It returns TRUE if the mail has been accepted, not if it has been sent:

Return Values

Returns TRUE if the mail was successfully accepted for delivery, FALSE otherwise.

It is important to note that just because the mail was accepted for delivery, it does NOT mean the mail will actually reach the intended destination.

I would suggest using http://swiftmailer.org/ with SMTP rather than mail().

edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

Community

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answered Feb 14 '12 at 12:10

Tim

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@Tim i cant seem to get the swiftmailer to work, as far as i can see it uses smtp sendmail anyway doesnt it? When setting it up, it just gives a blank screen when submitted contact details. – Robert Feb 14 '12 at 14:29

score 0 · Answer 5 · edited Feb 14 '12 at 15:07

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You should use double quotes instead of single quotes in the variable $subject

$subject = "Email From {$name} from your website";

edited Feb 14 '12 at 15:07

Colin Brock

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answered Feb 14 '12 at 12:07

Custodio

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score 0 · Answer 6 · answered Feb 14 '12 at 12:50

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The first line of $headers is invalid if $email is just an email address. Presumably you would want something like:

$headers = "Cc: " . $email . "\r\n";

or

$headers = "From: " . $email . "\r\n";

answered Feb 14 '12 at 12:50

SimonMayer

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score 0 · Answer 7 · answered Feb 14 '12 at 13:03

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The cause can be for example, you don't have setup a mail server, or configuration of firewall if you has it.

answered Feb 14 '12 at 13:03

chenio

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Mail() not working, any ideas why?

7 Answers7