How to Send an Email Using Windows PowerShell

Zakhar Yung

5 years ago

Windows PowerShell is mostly known as a command-line shell used to solve some administration tasks in Windows and apps running on this OS. At the same time, it is a scripting language that allows you to tailor cmdlets – lightweight commands to perform specific functions. And today, we’ll talk about Send-MailMessage, a cmdlet to send emails from PowerShell, as well as other ways to handle this.

The simplest script to send an email with PowerShell

Let’s start with simple things. Here is a one-line script based on the Send-MailMessage cmdlet you can use right now to send an email from PowerShell using SMTP protocol.

Send-MailMessage -To “<recipient’s email address>” -From “<sender’s email address>”  -Subject “Your message subject” -Body “Some important plain text!” -Credential (Get-Credential) -SmtpServer “<smtp server>” -Port 587

All you need is to insert the email address of a sender and a recipient, as well as specify the SMTP server you’re going to use. Then copy-paste this script to your PowerShell and press enter.

Mailtrap will help us to check whether it works. Sign up and go to your Demo inbox. Find SMTP credentials and tweak the script like this:

Send-MailMessage -To “jon-snow@winterfell.com” -From “mother-of-dragons@houseoftargaryen.net”  -Subject “Hey, Jon” -Body “Some important plain text!” -Credential (Get-Credential) -SmtpServer “smtp.mailtrap.io” -Port 587

Here, we’ve just specified the SMTP host. The addresses of the recipient and the sender are not real, as you might have guessed. And that’s one of the benefits of using a fake SMTP server. You don’t have to deal with actual email to test the email workflow. Alternatively, you can use a dummy email, but it can be a poor testing practice. Learn why in our blog post Why Using Dummy Email for Testing Just Doesn’t Work.

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Once you copy and paste this script to PowerShell and hit enter, a window requesting SMTP credentials (username and password) will pop up. Fill them in with those of Mailtrap, and that’s it. Check your Demo inbox and find your message.

Can I send an HTML email or an email with attachments from PowerShell to multiple recipients?

Yes you can! Send-MailMessage lets you pump up your email with the many parameters including HTML content, priority, and so on. Also, you can send emails to multiple recipients by specifying them in the corresponding parameter. Here is what you can make use of:

Parameter	Description
`-To`	Email address of a recipient or recipients
`-Bcc`	Email address of a BCC recipient or recipients
`-Cc`	Email address of a CC recipient or recipients
`-From`	Sender’s email address
`-Subject`	Email subject
`-Body`	Email body text
`-BodyAsHtml`	Defines that email body text contains HTML
`-Attachments`	Filenames to be attached and the path to them
`-Credential`	Authentication to send the email from the account
`-SmtpServer`	Name of the SMTP server
`-Port`	Port of the SMTP server
`-DeliveryNotificationOption`	The sender(s) specified in the Form parameter will be notified on the email delivery. Here are the options: `None` – notifications are off (default parameter) `OnSuccess` – notification of a successful delivery `OnFailure` – notification of an unsuccessful delivery `Delay` – notification of a delayed delivery `Never` – never receive notifications
`-Encoding`	The encoding for the body and subject
`-Priority`	Defines the level of priority of the message. Valid options are: `Normal` (default parameter) `Low` `High`
`-UseSsl`	Connection to the SMTP server will be established using the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol

So, let’s make a script that will send an email containing HTML text and an attachment. This time, we’ll define the parameters in advance and then refer to them in the Send-MailMessage cmdlet:

$From = "mother-of-dragons@houseoftargaryen.net"
$To = "jon-snow@winterfell.com", "jorah-mormont@night.watch”
$Cc = "tyrion-lannister@westerlands.com"
$Attachment = "C:\Temp\Drogon.jpg"
$Subject = "Photos of Drogon"
$Body = "<h2>Guys, look at these pics of Drogon!</h2><br><br>"
$Body += “He is so cute!”
$SMTPServer = "smtp.mailtrap.io"
$SMTPPort = "587"
Send-MailMessage -From $From -to $To -Cc $Cc -Subject $Subject -Body $Body -BodyAsHtml -SmtpServer $SMTPServer -Port $SMTPPort -UseSsl -Credential (Get-Credential) -Attachments $Attachment

As you noticed, we used $Body += to add a new line to the body text of the message. And that’s how the email looks in the Mailtrap inbox.

Start testing your PowerShell emails for free.

Send an email from PowerShell using the Gmail SMTP server

Everything is cool when you use a fake SMTP server for testing. But what if we send a message via a real one like Gmail. In this case, add smtp.gmail.com as the SMTP host and use real email addresses for a sender (your Gmail address) and a recipient.

We made an attempt and filled in credentials in the pop-up window. But the server replied with an error – 551 Authentication Required. To fix this issue, you need to turn on the Less secure app access in the Security tab of your Google Account. We did it, and PowerShell successfully delivered our message to the destination. Discover more about SMTP response codes and commands in our dedicated blog post.

SMTP settings for popular email providers

Not everyone is a Gmail user. So, the following data might be to the point if you use another SMTP host.

Service	SMTP server	Port	Connection
Gmail	`smtp.gmail.com`	587 25 465	TLS TLS SSL
Office 365	`smtp.office365.com`	587 25	TLS
Outlook.com	`smtp-mail.outlook.com`	587 25	TLS
Yahoo mail	`smtp.mail.yahoo.com`	587 25 465	TLS TLS SSL
Windows Live Hotmail	`smtp.live.com`	587 25	TLS
Zoho	`smtp.zoho.com`	587 465	TLS SSL

Send emails from PowerShell using EASendMail

EASendMail is an SMTP component that supports such protocols as SMTP, ESMTP (extended SMTP), EWS (Exchange Web Service), and WebDAV (Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning) protocols. The component is mostly used to send emails in COM/.NET/.NET Core environment applications and apps built with:

ASP
VB
VBA
VC++
C++/CLI
C#
VB.NET
JavaScript
ASP.NET
Delphi

Also, you can use EASendMail to send emails from PowerShell. God only knows why you may need it but here is a guide for this:

Step 1: Install EASendMail using the installer
Step 2: Create the following script

[reflection.assembly]::LoadFile("C:\Program Files (x86)\EASendMail\Lib\net20\EASendMail.dll")
#change the path to the EASendMail.dll file if you have another build of run-time assembly for .NET Framework, .NET Core, or .NET Compact Framework

function SendMailTo($sender, $name, $address, $subject, $body, $htmlFormat) {

    $mail = New-Object EASendMail.SmtpMail("TryIt") # you can replace “TryIt” with your license code for EASendMail SMTP component
    $mail.From.Address = $sender

    $recipient = New-Object EASendMail.MailAddress($name, $address)
    $mail.To.Add($recipient) > $null

    $mail.Subject = $subject
    if($htmlFormat) {
        $mail.HtmlBody = $body
    }
    else {
        $mail.TextBody = $body
    }

    $server = New-Object EASendMail.SmtpServer("smtp.mailtrap.io")
    $server.User = "*********"
    $server.Password = "*********"

    $server.Port = 587

    $server.ConnectType = [EASendMail.SmtpConnectType]::ConnectTryTLS
# specify your settings of the SMTP server, username, password, port, and connection type

    $smtp = New-Object EASendMail.SmtpClient
    $smtp.SendMail($server, $mail)
}

function SendMailFromPowerShell () {
    $sender = "mother-of-dragons@houseoftargaryen.net"
    $name = "Jon Snow"
    $address = "jon-snow@winterfell.com"
    $subject = "Happy Samhain"
    $body = "Jonny, congrats on Samhain!"
# specify your settings of sender’s email address and name, recipient’s email address, as well as subject and body text of the message
    try {
        "Start to send email to {0} ..." -f $address
        SendMailTo $sender $name $address $subject $body ""
        "Email to {0} has been submitted to server!" -f $address
    }
    catch [System.Exception] {
        "Failed to send email: {0}" -f  $_.Exception.Message
    }
}

SendMailFromPowerShell

Step 3: Run the script and check the Mailtrap Demo inbox. Here is the message.

Start Testing

Mass mailing from PowerShell using EASendMail Service Queue

EASendMail SMTP component is useful for sending mass emails. For this, you don’t have to code multiple threadings. All you need is EASendMail Service that can send messages with multiple threadings automatically in background queue. Take a look at the following script for mass mailing of a message with an HTML template:

[reflection.assembly]::LoadFile("C:\Program Files (x86)\EASendMail\Lib\net20\EASendMail.dll")
#change the path to the EASendMail.dll file if you have another build of run-time assembly for .NET Framework, .NET Core, or .NET Compact Framework

function SendMailToQueue($sender, $name, $address, $subject, $body, $htmlFormat) {

    $mail = New-Object EASendMail.SmtpMail("TryIt")
    $mail.From.Address = $sender

    $recipient = New-Object EASendMail.MailAddress($name, $address)
    $mail.To.Add($recipient) > $null

    $mail.Subject = $subject
    if($htmlFormat) {
        $mail.HtmlBody = $body
    }
    else {
        $mail.TextBody = $body
    }

    $server = New-Object EASendMail.SmtpServer("smtp.mailtrap.io")
    $server.User = "*********"
    $server.Password = "*********"

    $server.Port = 587

    $server.ConnectType = [EASendMail.SmtpConnectType]::ConnectTryTLS
# specify your settings of the SMTP server, username, password, port, and connection type

    $smtp = New-Object EASendMail.SmtpClient
    $smtp.SendMailToQueue($server, $mail)
}

function OpenConnection () {

    $connectionString = "Server=localhost\AdminSystem;Database=test;Integrated security=SSPI;MultipleActiveResultSets=True;"
    Write-Host(("Connecting database {0} ..." -f $connectionString))
    $sqlConnection = New-Object System.Data.SqlClient.SqlConnection
    $sqlConnection.ConnectionString = $connectionString
# You can change the connection string to yours by specifying user and password: $connectionString = "Server=localhost\AdminSystem;Database=dbname;User Id=user;Password=yourpassword;MultipleActiveResultSets=True;"
    $sqlConnection.Open()
    Write-Host 'Connected'
    return $sqlConnection
}

function BuildHtmlBody ($sqlConnection) {
    Write-Host "Building HTML body based on database ..."

    $sqlQuery = "SELECT ID, Name, Email, Age, Department FROM users"
    $sqlCommand = New-Object System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand($sqlQuery, $sqlConnection);
    $reader = $sqlCommand.ExecuteReader()

    $html = "<!DOCTYPE html><html><body>"
    $html += "<div style=""font-family:'Segoe UI', Calibri, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 14px; max-width: 768px;"">"
    $html += "Dear {name}, <br /><br />This is a congrats email on Samhain. <br />"
    $html += "Here is full data in table:<br /><br />"
    $html +="<table style='border-spacing: 0px; border-style: solid; border-color: #ccc; border-width: 0 0 1px 1px;'>"

    while ($reader.Read()) {
        $name = $reader.GetString(1)
        $address = $reader.GetString(2)
        $age = $reader.GetInt32(3)
        $department = $reader.GetString(4)

        $html += "<tr>"
        $html += "<td style='padding: 10px; border-style: solid; border-color: #ccc; border-width: 1px 1px 0 0;'>{0}</td>"  -f $name
        $html += "<td style='padding: 10px; border-style: solid; border-color: #ccc; border-width: 1px 1px 0 0;'>{0}</td>" -f $address
        $html += "</tr>"

    }

    $reader.Close > $null
    $reader.Dispose > $null

    $sqlCommand.Close > $null
    $sqlCommand.Dispose > $null

    return $html
}

function SendMailFromDBToQueue () {
    $sender = "mother-of-dragons@houseoftargaryen.net"
    $subject = "Happy Samhain"

    $sqlConnection = OpenConnection
    $bodyTemplate = BuildHtmlBody($sqlConnection)

$sqlQuery = "SELECT ID, Name, Email, Age, Department FROM users"
        $sqlCommand = New-Object System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand($sqlQuery, $sqlConnection);
        $reader = $sqlCommand.ExecuteReader()
        while ($reader.Read()) {
            $name = $reader.GetString(1).Trim()
            $address = $reader.GetString(2).Trim()
            $body = $bodyTemplate.Replace("{name}", $name)

            Write-Host(("Start to send email to {0} ..." -f $address))
            SendMailToQueue $sender $name $address $subject $body "html"
            Write-Host(("Email to {0} has been submitted to easendmail service!" -f $address))
        }

        $reader.Close > $null
        $reader.Dispose > $null

        $sqlCommand.Close > $null
        $sqlCommand.Dispose > $null

        $sqlConnection.Close > $null
        $sqlConnection.Dispose > $null
    }
    catch [System.Exception] {
        "Failed to send email: {0}" -f  $_.Exception.Message
    }
}

SendMailFromDBToQueue

Send emails from PowerShell using System.Net.Mail API

Send-MailMessage cmdlet is the most common option for sending emails from PowerShell. But this was not always the case. It became available starting from PowerShell 3.0 and was based on System.Net.Mail API. It is a namespace that contains classes to send electronic messages to the SMTP server. The delivery is carried out using the SmtpClient.Send or .Send method. Let’s take a look at the following example:

$EmailFrom = “mother-of-dragons@houseoftargaryen.net”
$EmailTo = “jon-snow@winterfell.com”
$Subject = “Happy Samhain”
$Body = “Jonny, congrats on Samhain!”
$SMTPServer = “smtp.mailtrap.io”
$SMTPClient = New-Object Net.Mail.SmtpClient($SmtpServer, 587)
$SMTPClient.EnableSsl = $true
$SMTPClient.Credentials = New-Object System.Net.NetworkCredential("<username>", "<password>");
$SMTPClient.Send($EmailFrom, $EmailTo, $Subject, $Body)

Check out Mailtrap’s Demo inbox and voila – it’s in. Alternatively, you can use the .Send method and modified syntax like this one:

$smtpFrom = “mother-of-dragons@houseoftargaryen.net”
$smtpTo = “jon-snow@winterfell.com”
$messageSubject = “Happy Samhain”
$messageBody = “Jonny, congrats on Samhain!”
$smtpServer = “smtp.mailtrap.io”
$smtp = New-Object Net.Mail.SmtpClient($SmtpServer, 587)
$smtp.EnableSsl = $true
$smtp.Credentials = New-Object System.Net.NetworkCredential("94b784b5970edf", "01a5d515011f6e");
$smtp.Send($smtpFrom , $smtpTo, $messageSubject, $messageBody)

Learn how exactly Mailtrap can help you streamline email testing processes from our case study with The Software House.

To wrap up

The System.Net.Mail namespace is also used to create and send messages in ASP.NET C# that we’ve also blogged about. And that’s it for today. We hope that this blog post broadened your skills in using PowerShell. Follow our blog and discover useful expertise for your projects.