How to send emails by Gmail SMTP Emails in PHP

I’ll show you how to make this Bootstrap form send emails using SMTP.

We’ll do this in PHP with PHPMailer, because:

• It’s reliable

• Supports SMTP authentication

• Works with Gmail, Outlook, and custom mail servers

Install PHPMailer

You can either:

• Via Composer (recommended)

• composer require phpmailer/phpmailer

• Or download from: PHPMailer GitHub and include it manually.

HTML Form

<form action="sendmail.php" method="post" autocomplete="off">
<div class="mb-3">
<label for="name" class="form-label">Full Name</label>
<input type="text" name="name" class="form-control" id="name" required autocomplete="off">
</div>

<div class="mb-3">
<label for="email" class="form-label">Email address</label>
<input type="email" name="email" class="form-control" id="email" required autocomplete="off">
</div>

<div class="mb-3">
<label for="message" class="form-label">Message</label>
<textarea name="message" class="form-control" id="message" rows="3" required></textarea>
</div>

<button type="submit" class="btn btn-primary">Send Email</button>
</form>

PHP: sendmail.php

<?php
use PHPMailer\PHPMailer\PHPMailer;
use PHPMailer\PHPMailer\Exception;

require 'vendor/autoload.php'; // If using Composer

if ($_SERVER['REQUEST_METHOD'] == 'POST') {
$name = htmlspecialchars($_POST['name']);
$email = htmlspecialchars($_POST['email']);
$message = htmlspecialchars($_POST['message']);

$mail = new PHPMailer(true);

try {
// SMTP Configuration
$mail->isSMTP();
$mail->Host = 'smtp.gmail.com'; // Change to your SMTP server
$mail->SMTPAuth = true;
$mail->Username = 'your-email@gmail.com'; // Your email
$mail->Password = 'your-app-password'; // App password, not normal password
$mail->SMTPSecure = PHPMailer::ENCRYPTION_STARTTLS;
$mail->Port = 587;

// From & To
$mail->setFrom('your-email@gmail.com', 'Website Contact');
$mail->addAddress('your-email@gmail.com', 'Your Name'); // Where to send

// Email Content
$mail->isHTML(true);
$mail->Subject = 'New Contact Form Submission';
$mail->Body = "
<h3>New Message from Website</h3>
<p><strong>Name:</strong> {$name}</p>
<p><strong>Email:</strong> {$email}</p>
<p><strong>Message:</strong><br>{$message}</p>
";

// Send Email
$mail->send();
echo "Message sent successfully!";
} catch (Exception $e) {
echo "Message could not be sent. Error: {$mail->ErrorInfo}";
}
}

Notes for Gmail SMTP

• You can’t use your normal Gmail password — you need an App Password.

• Steps:

  1. Enable 2-Step Verification in Google Account.

  2. Go to Google App Passwords.(https://myaccount.google.com/apppasswords)

  3. Generate one for “Mail” and copy it.

  4. Use it in $mail->Password.