cPanel send email in production using Laravel 5.4

Question

I have a Laravel project on Godaddy web hosting

I want to send an email on submitting some data

So I tested on my local machine with my Gmail account "sent from me to me" and it worked fine, but when I moved the same exact configuration errors just started popping out of nowhere

I got an error related to some socket and I found an answer for that one.

I tried using the email created in cPanel, didn't work.

I tried to set the Gmail account that was working fine, also not working.

The Gmail account kept giving me this error

local.ERROR: Connection could not be established with host smtp.gmail.com [Connection refused #111] {"exception":"[object] (Swift_TransportException(code: 0): Connection could not be established with host smtp.gmail.com [Connection refused #111] at /home/cr4jtnq8a04f/public_html/vendor/swiftmailer/swiftmailer/lib/classes/Swift/Transport/StreamBuffer.php:269)
[stacktrace]

When I changed to the cpanel email settings, I found no error neither the email that was supposed to be sent.

Here is my .env settings for the cPanel email settings

MAIL_DRIVER=smtp
MAIL_HOST=mail.glistars.com
MAIL_PORT=25
MAIL_USERNAME=info@glistars.com
MAIL_PASSWORD=MyPassword
MAIL_ENCRYPTION=tls

Here is my config/mail.php file

<?php

return [

    /*
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    | Mail Driver
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    |
    | Laravel supports both SMTP and PHP's "mail" function as drivers for the
    | sending of e-mail. You may specify which one you're using throughout
    | your application here. By default, Laravel is setup for SMTP mail.
    |
    | Supported: "smtp", "sendmail", "mailgun", "mandrill", "ses",
    |            "sparkpost", "log", "array"
    |
    */

    'driver' => env('MAIL_DRIVER', 'smtp'),

    /*
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    | SMTP Host Address
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    |
    | Here you may provide the host address of the SMTP server used by your
    | applications. A default option is provided that is compatible with
    | the Mailgun mail service which will provide reliable deliveries.
    |
    */

    'host' => env('MAIL_HOST', 'smtp.mailgun.org'),

    /*
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    | SMTP Host Port
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    |
    | This is the SMTP port used by your application to deliver e-mails to
    | users of the application. Like the host we have set this value to
    | stay compatible with the Mailgun e-mail application by default.
    |
    */

    'port' => env('MAIL_PORT', 587),

    /*
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    | Global "From" Address
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    |
    | You may wish for all e-mails sent by your application to be sent from
    | the same address. Here, you may specify a name and address that is
    | used globally for all e-mails that are sent by your application.
    |
    */

    'from' => [
        'address' => env('MAIL_FROM_ADDRESS', 'info@glistars.com'),
        'name' => env('MAIL_FROM_NAME', 'Glitter Stars'),
    ],

    /*
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    | E-Mail Encryption Protocol
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    |
    | Here you may specify the encryption protocol that should be used when
    | the application send e-mail messages. A sensible default using the
    | transport layer security protocol should provide great security.
    |
    */

    'encryption' => env('MAIL_ENCRYPTION', 'tls'),

    /*
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    | SMTP Server Username
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    |
    | If your SMTP server requires a username for authentication, you should
    | set it here. This will get used to authenticate with your server on
    | connection. You may also set the "password" value below this one.
    |
    */

    'username' => env('MAIL_USERNAME'),

    'password' => env('MAIL_PASSWORD'),

    /*
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    | Sendmail System Path
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    |
    | When using the "sendmail" driver to send e-mails, we will need to know
    | the path to where Sendmail lives on this server. A default path has
    | been provided here, which will work well on most of your systems.
    |
    */

    'sendmail' => '/usr/sbin/sendmail -bs',

    /*
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    | Markdown Mail Settings
    |--------------------------------------------------------------------------
    |
    | If you are using Markdown based email rendering, you may configure your
    | theme and component paths here, allowing you to customize the design
    | of the emails. Or, you may simply stick with the Laravel defaults!
    |
    */

    'markdown' => [
        'theme' => 'default',

        'paths' => [
            resource_path('views/vendor/mail'),
        ],
    ],

    'stream' => [
    'ssl' => [
        'allow_self_signed' => true,
        'verify_peer' => false,
        'verify_peer_name' => false,
        ],
    ],

];

Here is my controller function

public function send() {

      $data = [
        'name' => request('name'),
        'phone' => request('phone'),
        'message' => request('message'),
        'lang' => request('lang'),
      ];

      Mail::to('abdul.elah.js@gmail.com')->send(new Enquiry($data));

    return response()->json([ 'message' => 'Email Sent Successfully' ]);

}

I am getting the response back but the email is not sent.

Answer 1

It likely has to do with sending with TLS on port 25. Port 25 is the non-encrypted SMTP port, generally. In theory you can use any port with any encryption, but Google might not like it. Have you tried the same configuration with non-Google recipients?

In any case, try sending on port 587 and failing that on 465 (with SSL instead of TLS).

If that doesn't work, try to simplify your problem by sending to a recipient that doesn't have any security (just for testing) and using a standalone SMTP library.