HTML Email doesn't send (python3)

Question

I'm trying to send an HTML email, however, when I run this code, literally nothing happens. I sit and wait as the program never finishes. What did I do wrong?

import smtplib, ssl, getpass
from email.mime.text import MIMEText
from email.mime.multipart import MIMEMultipart
port = 465
smtp_server = "smtp.gmail.com"
sender_email = "REDACTED"  
receiver_email = "REDACTED"
password = getpass.getpass()
html = """
<html>
<head></head>
<body>
    <h1>HEADER</h1>
    <br>
    body<br>
</body>
</html>
"""
msg = MIMEMultipart()
attach = MIMEText(html, 'html')
msg.attach(attach)

context = ssl.create_default_context()
with smtplib.SMTP_SSL(smtp_server, port, context=context) as server:
    server.login(sender_email, password)
    server.sendmail(sender_email, receiver_email, msg)
    server.close()

Malcolm · Accepted Answer · 2020-11-06 03:09:30Z

1

The msg needs to be flattened to a string before passing it to the sendmail method:

server.sendmail(sender_email, receiver_email, str(msg))

Also, you'll probably want to set some headers on the msg object:

msg.add_header('From', sender_email)
msg.add_header('Subject', 'whatever')

Enabling the debug output for the SMTP object would help to track down these problems, try inserting this line above the server.login call:

server.set_debuglevel(1)

If you're going to be working with email though it may be worth looking in to the email.message.EmailMessage class.

answered Nov 6, 2020 at 3:09

Malcolm

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1 Comment

mehtaarn000 Over a year ago

Converting the msg to a string with str() did the trick!

Toby Clark · Accepted Answer · 2020-11-06 02:26:31Z

I've found sending mail using gmails SMTP server hard and difficult to work out (The only way I have even gotten it to work is by using a temporary thing that lets me send emails through my email address and only works half the time)

Instead, I suggest sending your email through SendGrid, using their python API, or another service that offers a similar function (Not being biased just have used SendGrid before and found it very easy and reliable) and just send a request to that every time you want to send an email.

I know its a dodgy way to get it to work but its the only way I've been able to send emails through my Gmail account using python :)

(Id comment this as it isn't really an answer but a workaround however I don't have enough reputation)

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