phpmailerHow do I use PHPMailer to embed an image in an email using Base64 encoding?

To use PHPMailer to embed an image in an email using Base64 encoding, you need to use the addStringAttachment() method. This method takes three parameters: the content of the attachment, the filename, and the encoding type. The content should be the Base64 encoded string of the image, the filename should be the desired name of the image, and the encoding type should be 'base64'.

Example code

<?php

use PHPMailer\PHPMailer\PHPMailer;
use PHPMailer\PHPMailer\Exception;

require 'vendor/autoload.php';

$mail = new PHPMailer(true);

$mail->isSMTP();
$mail->Host = 'smtp.gmail.com';
$mail->SMTPAuth = true;
$mail->Username = '[email protected]';
$mail->Password = 'password';
$mail->SMTPSecure = 'tls';
$mail->Port = 587;

$mail->setFrom('[email protected]', 'Mailer');
$mail->addAddress('[email protected]', 'Receiver');

$mail->Subject = 'Embedded Image';
$mail->Body = 'This is an embedded image:';

$imageString = base64_encode(file_get_contents('image.jpg'));
$mail->addStringAttachment($imageString, 'image.jpg', 'base64');

$mail->send();

echo 'Message has been sent';

?>

Output example

Message has been sent

Code explanation

• require 'vendor/autoload.php'; - This line includes the PHPMailer library.
• $mail = new PHPMailer(true); - This line creates a new instance of the PHPMailer class.
• $mail->isSMTP(); - This line sets the mailer to use SMTP.
• $mail->Host = 'smtp.gmail.com'; - This line sets the SMTP host.
• $mail->SMTPAuth = true; - This line sets SMTP authentication to true.
• $mail->Username = '[email protected]'; - This line sets the SMTP username.
• $mail->Password = 'password'; - This line sets the SMTP password.
• $mail->SMTPSecure = 'tls'; - This line sets the SMTP security type.
• $mail->Port = 587; - This line sets the SMTP port.
• $mail->setFrom('[email protected]', 'Mailer'); - This line sets the from address and name.
• $mail->addAddress('[email protected]', 'Receiver'); - This line adds the recipient address and name.
• $mail->Subject = 'Embedded Image'; - This line sets the email subject.
• $mail->Body = 'This is an embedded image:'; - This line sets the email body text.
• $imageString = base64_encode(file_get_contents('image.jpg')); - This line encodes the image in Base64.
• $mail->addStringAttachment($imageString, 'image.jpg', 'base64'); - This line adds the image as an attachment to the email.
• $mail->send(); - This line sends the email.

Helpful links

• PHPMailer Documentation
• Base64 Encode/Decode

Edit this code on GitHub