Setting different reply-to message in Python email/smtplib

python email smtplib

30,444

Solution 1

Here's my take on it. I believe that the "Reply-To" header should be set explicitly. The likely reason is that it's less commonly used than headers such as "Subject", "To", and "From".

python
Python 2.6.6 (r266:84292, May 10 2011, 11:07:28)
[GCC 4.2.1 (Apple Inc. build 5666) (dot 3)] on darwin
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> MAIL_SERVER = 'smtp.domain.example'
>>> TO_ADDRESS = '[email protected]'
>>> FROM_ADDRESS = '[email protected]'
>>> REPLY_TO_ADDRESS = '[email protected]'
>>> import smtplib
>>> import email.mime.multipart
>>> msg = email.mime.multipart.MIMEMultipart()
>>> msg['to'] = TO_ADDRESS
>>> msg['from'] = FROM_ADDRESS
>>> msg['subject'] = 'testing reply-to header'
>>> msg.add_header('reply-to', REPLY_TO_ADDRESS)
>>> server = smtplib.SMTP(MAIL_SERVER)
>>> server.sendmail(msg['from'], [msg['to']], msg.as_string())
{}

Solution 2

I had the same question and all I had to do to make it work was to set the header in lowercase like so:

msg['reply-to'] = "[email protected]"

Solution 3

For Python3 in 2021 I would recommend the following to construct the message:

from email.message import EmailMessage
from email.utils import formataddr
msg = EmailMessage()
msg['Subject'] = "Message Subject"
msg['From'] = formataddr(("Sender's Name", "[email protected]"))
msg['Reply-To'] = formataddr(("Name of Reply2", "[email protected]"))
msg['To'] = formataddr(("John Smith", "[email protected]"))
msg.set_content("""\
<html>
  <head></head>
  <body>
    <p>A simple test email</p>
  </body>
</html>
""", subtype='html')

Then to send the message I use the following for my mail server which uses StartTLS on port 587:

from smtplib import SMTP
from ssl import create_default_context as context
with SMTP('smtp.domain.example', 587) as server:
    server.starttls(context=context())
    server.login('[email protected]', password)
    server.send_message(msg)

Solution 4

As Jonathon Reinhart pointed out, the "To" needs to be upper case:

msg['Reply-To'] = "[email protected]"

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30,444

Author by

eli

Updated on May 05, 2021

Comments

eli about 2 years
I am using Python email and smtplib to send an email from Python. I am doing this via the Gmail SMTP server using my Gmail credentials. This works fine, however I would like to specify a Reply-to email address different from the from address, so that replies go to a separate address (non-Gmail.)

I have tried creating a reply to parameter like this:
```
   msg = MIMEMultipart()
   msg['From'] = "[email protected]"
   msg['To'] = to
   msg['Subject'] = subject
   msg['Reply-to'] = "[email protected]"
```
But this doesn't work. Can't find any info on this in the Python docs.

Thanks.
Nico Albers almost 5 years

it seems that add_header behaves pretty the same like __setitem__(), therefore the original approach (with proper spelling/upper/lowercase) should also work, compare the docs: docs.python.org/release/2.6.6/library/…
Brōtsyorfuzthrāx almost 5 years

It worked for me in Python 3.6.5. It's worth noting that you can put multiple emails in this, and when people reply they'll reply to all of them.
Brōtsyorfuzthrāx almost 5 years

On second thought, the accepted answer works in more situations than this does in Python 3.6.5.
Franco Gil over 3 years

It is actually working on python 3.6.9, thanks mate.