Email sending not working on setup (PHP/WordPress)

Posted on July 11, 2020

Hello,

I have WordPress installed on a Droplet with WP SMTP plugin(with Gmail setup configuration). It works when I send a test email via plugin page inside WordPress admin panel. Follow to that, I installed postfix to deliver emails. I have WordPress Contact Form (contact form 7) plugin installed which triggers email sending.

But, when I run this command, and check my inbox, I don’t receive any email.

echo "Test Email message body" | mail -s "Email test subject" <my-email-address>@gmail.com

When I checked my log file (tail -20 /var/log/mail.log), following is what I see there.

Jul 11 04:50:39 ch-graphql postfix/smtp[32233]: 54B4281672: to=<my-target@gmail.com>,
relay=gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com[74.125.142.26]:25,
delay=0.25,
delays=0.04/0.01/0.07/0.13,
dsn=5.7.28,
status=bounced (host gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com[74.125.142.26] said: 550-5.7.28 [xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx       1]

Our system has detected an unusual rate of 550-5.7.28 unsolicited mail originating from your IP address. To protect our 550-5.7.28 users from spam, mail sent from your IP address has been blocked. 550-5.7.28 Please visit 550-5.7.28  https://support.google.com/mail/?p=UnsolicitedIPError to review our 550 5.7.28 Bulk Email Senders Guidelines. m134si5397108pfd.183 - gsmtp (in reply to end of DATA command))

What could be wrong here? Let me know if you need more information. Thank you in advance.

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Server Enthusiast

July 14, 2020

Hello,

It looks like that your IP address does not yet have a good mail reputation. What you could do is use Gmail SMTP for the time being to prevent your emails from being rejected.

alexdo

February 25, 2022

Hello there,

It is recommended to use ports 465 or 587 instead of insecure ports like 25 and also to use an SMTP plugin as well.

I’ll also recommend using a third-party mail provider like SendGrid to send your emails. You can also check this tutorial on: Why You May Not Want To Run Your Own Mail Server

https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/why-you-may-not-want-to-run-your-own-mail-server

Hope that this helps!