Sending Emails with Django
Sending an Email
send_mail() takes a subject, plain-text message, sender address, and a list of recipients, and returns how many were sent successfully.
Example: Sending an Email
send_mail() returns 1 if the message was accepted for delivery by the configured backend, 0 otherwise.
from django.core.mail import send_mail
def send_welcome_email(user_email):
send_mail(
'Welcome!',
'Thanks for joining our site.',
'[email protected]',
[user_email],
)The Console Email Backend
During development, the console backend prints emails to the terminal instead of actually sending them — no real mail server needed.
Note: This is the safest way to test email-sending code without spamming real inboxes.
Example: The Console Email Backend
Every call to send_mail() will now print the full email content to your terminal instead of delivering it.
EMAIL_BACKEND = 'django.core.mail.backends.console.EmailBackend'Calling send_mail() from a View
A view can trigger an email as a side effect of another action, like after a successful registration.
Example: Calling send_mail() from a View
This keeps the email-sending logic small and reusable, called right after the account is actually created.
from django.core.mail import send_mail
from django.shortcuts import redirect
def register_and_notify(request, new_user):
send_mail(
'Account Created',
f'Welcome, {new_user.username}!',
'[email protected]',
[new_user.email],
)
return redirect('home')- Forgetting to configure EMAIL_BACKEND, causing Django to silently try (and fail) to connect to a real mail server during development.
- Hardcoding real SMTP credentials directly in settings.py instead of loading them from environment variables.
- Not checking the return value of send_mail(), which returns the number of successfully delivered messages.
- send_mail() is Django's built-in shortcut for sending email from a view.
- EMAIL_BACKEND controls where mail actually goes — the console backend prints emails to the terminal during development.
- send_mail() takes a subject, message, from address, and a list of recipient addresses.
- Production email credentials should come from environment variables, never be hardcoded.
Chapter Quiz — Complete all 12 topics to unlock
0/12 topics done
Complete these topics first:
- Introduction to Django's Auth System
- The User Model Overview
- Setting Up a Login View
- Logout Functionality
- User Registration Form
- The login_required Decorator
- The permission_required Decorator
- Django Groups and Permissions
- Password Hashing in Django
- Session Authentication Basics
- Introduction to Custom User Models
- Sending Emails with Django