Viewing Article

SMTP is responsible for sending out your messages. So if you get SMTP error message, it means your e-mails were not send. It is very important you to understand why this has happened so that you can fix the problem. All SMTP codes consist of three digits, for example, 550, 221, 354, etc. Not all of them mean some type of error. In order to understand how these codes work, you have to know that each digit (the first, the second and the third) have there own meaning.

The first digit tells you if your command was accepted and processed. There are five different values for that:

1.Mail server has accepted the command, but does not yet take any action. A confirmation message is required.
2.Mail server has completed the task successfully without errors.
3.Mail server has understood the request, but requires further information to complete it.
4.Mail server has encountered a temporary failure. If the command is repeated without any change, it might be
completed. Try again, it may help!
5.Mail server has encountered a fatal error. Your request can't be processed.

As you can see, the codes that start with 4 and 5 are the ones that tell you that your message won't be sent until you find and fix the problem.

The second digit tells you more:

1.Syntax error
2.Information reply (for example to HELP request)
3.This digit refers to the status of connection
4.This digit refers to the status of the mail server

Digits 3 and 4 are not used.

The third (last) digit of the code tells you the details of mail transferring status.