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DrSimple
DrSimple

Posted on • Edited on

Send mails using NodeJS

#node #javascript #webdev #beginners

Hey, fams! today we are going to learn how to send e-mails, right from our IDE using NodeJS. The module of interest is called Nodemailer.

puppy

Prerequisites

🔗 NodeJs
🔗 Nodemailer
🔗 Email account

🎯 Steps
Open editor (VSCode 😁), initialize your project with the command below

npm init -y
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This command initiates a package.json, package.json.lock, and index.js (main entry file). The index.js will house all our logic.

Dependencies

📌Install Nodemailer

npm i nodemailer
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📌 Import the package inside index.js

const nodemailer = require('nodemailer');
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👨🏽‍🏫 For security reasons, make sure you install and use dot.env package to prevent your password from being exposed or pushed to GitHub.
Install dotenv

npm i dotenv -S
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ignor

Require dotenv in your index.js file. I didn't require it in this project because I am using dummy data.

require('dotenv').config();
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Then, create a .env file your email and password

Email= ***********@gmail.com
Password= ******
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env

Logic

🎯 Your auth logic in index.js with dotenv

// Gmail account info
const transporter = nodemailer.createTransport({
    service: 'gmail',
    auth: {
        user: process.env.EMAIL,
        pass: process.env.PASSWORD
    }
});
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🎯 Your auth logic in index.js without dotenv. Write the logic below and of course change the email to your own and the password to yours too.

// Gmail account info
const transporter = nodemailer.createTransport({
    service: 'gmail',
    auth: {
        user: 'dsimple@gmail.com',
        pass: 'ilovemymama'
    }
});
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🎯 Next use the mailOption to send your message.

// Email info
const mailOptions = {
    from: 'dsimple@gmail.com',
    to: 'fams@gmail.com',
    subject: 'How to send emails using NodeJS',
    text: 'Follow the instructions and you will be fine'
};
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🎯 Lastly, write:

// Send email 📧  and retrieve server response
transporter.sendMail(mailOptions, function(error, info) {
    if (error) {
        console.log(error);
    } else {
        console.log('Email sent: ' + info.response);
    }
});
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When done properly, you should have the following logic in your index.js. That is if you choose not to use the dotenv
carbon (28)

To run: type 👇🏼 in your terminal

node index
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Note: On your Gmail, do not forget to accept and allow the "Less secure apps" access to use your scripts with your Gmail SMTP connection. Gmail will alert you with an error if this option is off, you need to turn it on.
alert

Disable Less App Here

Multiple emails, CC and BCC 

const mailOptions = {
    from: 'dsimple@gmail.com',
    to: 'fams@gmail.com,myrealfams@gmail.com',
    cc: 'lexus@gmail.com',
    bcc: 'sugar@gmail.com',
    subject: 'How to send emails using NodeJS',
    text: 'Follow the instructions and you will be fine'
};
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Send attachment 

const mailOptions = {
    from: 'dsimple@gmail.com',
    to: 'fams@gmail.com,myrealfams@gmail.com',
    cc: 'lexus@gmail.com',
    bcc: 'sugar@gmail.com',
    subject: 'How to send emails using NodeJS',
    text: 'Follow the instructions and you will be fine',
    attachments: [{
    filename: "robocop.jpg", path: "./img/robocop.jpg"}]
};
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Thanks 🙌🏽 for reading
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Discuss

What other email 📬 services can you use apart from Gmail without toggling off the Less Secure App setting?

Reference

Download NodeJs
npm Reference
Nodemailer site

Latest comments (20)

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silentashish profile image
Ashish Gautam •

Your mail will ended up in spam if you use google smtp.

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suchitra_13 profile image
Suchitra •

Thank you so much.
But I am facing difficulty in attachment sending part, I have tried 3 times but couldn't send only text sent!

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jlong4223 profile image
Jared Long •

@Suchitra try adding an 's' to attachment: attachments: [{

I ran into the same thing with just text showing up and checked the nodemailer documentation on attachements. That little mispelling fix should do the trick.

Also, if you want to learn how to do this with a React frontend and Google OAuth2, check out my nodemailer article as well :)

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suchitra_13 profile image
Suchitra •

Thank you so much
It's working fine now:)

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drsimplegraffiti profile image
DrSimple •

@Suchitra

Do you have a folder where your image is stored?

Example:

attachment: [{
filename: "robocop.jpg", path: "./img/robocop.jpg"}]
};

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suchitra_13 profile image
Suchitra •

I kept image file in same folder where my index.js is present.
So in this case I just wrote:

attachment: [{
filename: "robocop.jpg", path: "robocop.jpg"}]
};

But it is not working:(

Thread Thread
 
horomancer profile image
horomancer •

shouldn't it be 

path: "./robocop.jpg"
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leandrodiascarvalho profile image
leandro dias de carvalho •

Parabens pelo conteúdo.

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drsimplegraffiti profile image
DrSimple •

obrigado muito apreciado

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drsimplegraffiti profile image
DrSimple •

@mvoloskov Thanks for the contribution. It's always safety first.

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mvoloskov profile image
Miloslav 🏳️‍🌈 🦋 Voloskov •

Kudos for teaching dotenv at the very beginning! I often see people pushing sensitive data into a public repo just because they treated environment security as an afterthought.

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drsimplegraffiti profile image
DrSimple •

@njokdan You are welcome 😊

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njokudanielo profile image
NJOKU DANIEL • • Edited

Good content...Thanks

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drsimplegraffiti profile image
DrSimple •

@brandonwallace Thanks

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brandonwallace profile image
brandon_wallace •

Nice article! Thanks for posting it.

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drsimplegraffiti profile image
DrSimple •

@salarc123 ... Thanks for the compliment. I will write as requested.

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