Represents an e-mail message that can be sent using the SmtpClient class.
Assembly: System (in System.dll)
Instances of the MailMessage class are used to construct e-mail messages that are transmitted to an SMTP server for delivery using the SmtpClient class.
The sender, recipient, subject, and body of an e-mail message may be specified as parameters when a MailMessage is used to initialize a MailMessage object. These parameters may also be set or accessed using properties on the MailMessage object.
The primary mail message headers and elements for the message may be set using the following properties of the MailMessage class.
Mail header or part | Property |
|---|---|
Attachments | |
Blind carbon copies (BCC) | |
Carbon copies (CC) | |
Content-Type | |
Encoding for custom headers | |
Message body | |
Priority | |
Recipient | |
Reply-To | |
Sender | |
Subject |
The MailMessage class also allows an application to access the headers collection for the message using the Headers property. While this collection is read-only (a new collection can not be set), custom headers can be added to or deleted from this collection. Any custom headers added will be included when the MailMessage instance is sent. Before a message is sent, only headers specifically added to this collection in the Headers property are included in the collection. After a the MailMessage instance is sent, the Headers property will also include headers that are set using the associated properties of the MailMessage class or parameters passed when a MailMessage is used to initialize a MailMessage object.
If some mail headers are malformed, they could cause the email message to become corrupted. So any mail header in the headers collection that can be set using a property on the MailMessage class should only be set using the MailMessage class property or as a parameter passed when a MailMessage initializes a MailMessage object. The following list of mail headers should not be added using the Headers property and any values set for these headers using the Headers property will be discarded or overwritten when the message is sent:
Bcc
Cc
Content-ID
Content-Location
Content-Transfer-Encoding
Content-Type
Date
From
Importance
MIME-Version
Priority
Reply-To
Sender
To
X-Priority
If the application does not specify an X-Sender header using the Headers property, the MailMessage class will create one when the message is sent.
Use the AlternateViews property to specify copies of an e-mail message in different formats. For example, if you send a message in HTML, you might also want to provide a plain text version in case some of the recipients use e-mail readers that cannot display HTML content. For an example that demonstrates creating a message with alternate views, see AlternateViews.
Use the Attachments property to add attachments to an e-mail message. For an example that demonstrates creating a message with an attachment, see Attachments.
After assembling your e-mail message, you can send it by using the Send or SendAsync methods.
The following code example demonstrates creating and sending an e-mail message that includes an attachment.
Windows 7, Windows Vista SP1 or later, Windows XP SP3, Windows XP SP2 x64 Edition, Windows Server 2008 (Server Core Role not supported), Windows Server 2008 R2 (Server Core Role not supported), Windows Server 2003 SP2
The .NET Framework does not support all versions of every platform. For a list of the supported versions, see .NET Framework System Requirements.