How to fix E-Mail problems in WordPress and WooCommerce

16. March 2016

Contents

1 Step 1: Install a log to see if mails get triggered
2 Step 2: Get a full mail account
3 Step 3: Configure a SMTP plugin
4 Checklist:

Last Updated on: 13th October 2017, 12:54 pm

A frequent issue in WordPress or WooCommerce: Email do not get sent. Here is a suggested path to resolve this.

Step 1: Install a log to see if mails get triggered

The first thing you want to do when dealing with this is make sure, that there is email activity to begin with. Here are two plugin that can help you:

Install one of them, then repeat the action that triggers the mail (register for a new account, purchase a product in your shop) and take a look at the log. Most times it will look similar to this.

Screen Shot 2016-03-16 at 14.03.52 — click for bigger size

Since there are entries of Email activity, the issue lies probably in the delivery method. So as a next step, we are going to exchange the default WordPress mail send feature with SMTP.

Step 2: Get a full mail account

Get a full mailbox account at a hosting provider of your choice, that provides you with:

SMTP Server
Login
Password

Gmail is a bit different, so do not use it. If you have no access to a full mailbox, get one now.

Step 3: Configure a SMTP plugin

Install and activate a SMTP plugin. Here are a few suggestions:

Fill in your account settings:

Click for larger image. Do NOT forget to activate the SMTP settings as indicated by the blue error.

and send another mail. This time it should work.

Checklist:

Install E-Mail Logger

Check if email gets logged by manual sent and manual order creation

Install and setup SMTP account

Verify SMTP settings with test mail

Swap php-mailer with SMTP mailer so all notification mails use SMTP

Tips:

If sending your test email via SMTP works, but you still get no WooCommerce notification mail, then you need to activate SMTP as indicated via the blue arrow in the screenshot above.

Need to send WooCommerce notification emails to multiple recipients? Try my plugin: How to send WooCommerce Email to multiple recipients

Series: Support, support, WooCommerce, WordPress

18 responses

Sahil

16. September 2016

Hi,

I am facing this email sending issue with new woocommerce orders.
Order confirmation emails are not sending automatically.
I have tried all three of these plugins.
I Can send the Order Processing/Confirmation email manually but it does not go automatically.
Test Email Also works.

Please help

Reply
1. Con Schneider
  
  20. September 2016
  
  Hello Sahil,
  
  I have added a checklist that illustrate the troubleshooting steps.
  Have you tried them all?
  
  Reply
2. Camila
  
  1. October 2016
  
  Hello,
  Thank you very much for your post was incredibly helpful.
  I want to contribute something to the friend who still has the same problem and probably others that still have not been able to solve this.
  I had the same problem, the mails were not going and then I found your post. I followed step by step, I checked, I installed the plugins, did the tests, but did not work.
  However, we discovered that this was because there are different exceptions according to web hosting you are using. In my case, the site is hosted at DreamHost and configuration was a little different:
  
  In the “SMTP Host” field instead of starting with “smtp.mydomain.cl” I put “mail.mydomain.cl”
  In the “SMTP Port” field instead of putting “25” put “465”.
  In the “Encryption” field check the “Use SSL Encryption” option.
  
  I think that was it. Now, thanks to the installed plugins and settings, emails are working perfectly.
  
  Thank you very much again for the help!
  
  Regards!
  
  Reply
  1. Con Schneider
    
    3. October 2016
    
    Hello Camila,
    
    Happy to hear you did find my post helpful. 🙂
    Thanks a lot for adding your input as well!
    
    Reply
James Robins

13. February 2017

This plugin takes care of stage 1 – logging the emails sent for each order

https://wordpress.org/plugins/order-emails-log-for-woocommerce/

Reply
1. Con Schneider
  
  13. February 2017
  
  Thank you for sharing this. All the best.
  
  Reply
Aries Ricohermoso

28. September 2017

hello not working on my side, anyone can you help to fix this issue?

Reply
1. Con Schneider
  
  28. September 2017
  
  Hi there,
  
  Happy to give some input. Where does it fail for you?
  
  Reply
Jinesh Tank

4. October 2017

My woocommerce mail problem is solved by reading this article,
Thanks a lot…………

Reply
1. Con Schneider
  
  4. October 2017
  
  Glad to hear. Cheers.
  
  Reply
Edgar

17. April 2020

That was easy setup, thank you for this tutorial and it helps me to on hold from buying dedicated SMTP providers as suggested by Woocommerce.

Reply
1. Con Schneider
  
  17. April 2020
  
  You are welcome. Glad it was helpful.
  
  Reply
Mehul

9. May 2020

Hi,

I am using a staging site and my email are not getting delivered, they appear in the email log though. I have used SMTP services, but the issue persists. Can you please help with anything else that i can do.

Reply
1. Con Schneider
  
  9. May 2020
  
  Hi there,
  
  If you see the mails being logged and your SMTP does not help, then your mail server reputation is probably too deteriorated and you need to use another mail provider. I use https://sendgrid.com/ in combination with https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-sendgrid-smtp/ for such cases.
  
  Reply
Himanshu bakshi

24. May 2020

Hi, I have a issue,when customer is placing a order on the website then blank email going to the admin. How I can resolve it. I have already try to check delete the all plugins but it’s not work. I have upload woocommece old version something 3 still email get the blank. and also my email has going very late and I have tried all the things such as install the SMTP plugin but it’s not working they are showing permanent address. Please if anyone solve my problem so let me know as soon as possible it’s urgent.

Thanks

Reply
1. Con Schneider
  
  24. May 2020
  
  Hi there,
  
  So you have an email log and the mails get logged, but all mails are blank, without content, correct? What might be happening is that your theme is overwriting the WooCommerce mail template files (for reference: https://docs.woocommerce.com/document/template-structure/) and these template files need an update.
  
  Reply
  1. Himanshu Bakshi
    
    24. May 2020
    
    Hi, I have tried this, and let see what the result gets, but there is an issue my woocommerce email going very delaying of the user and the admin. how I can get an email notification and confirmation of the user very fast. can you help me with this? I have already changed the hosting but still, emails are going very late. I hope you understand my point and will let me know the solution to this problem.
    
    Reply
    1. Con Schneider
      
      24. May 2020
      
      Hi again,
      
      > I have already changed the hosting but still, emails are going very late.
      
      I would try a dedicated transactional mail provider for this, i.e. Sendgrid: https://sendgrid.com/ + https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-sendgrid-smtp/
      
      Reply