Free, simple, PHP based email contact form

The HTML contact form code

<form method="POST" name="contact_form" action="contact-form-handler.php">
Enter Name: <input type="text" name="name">
Enter Email Address: <input type="text" name="email">
Enter Postal Address: <input type="text" name="postal_address">
Enter Message: <textarea name="message"></textarea>
<input type="submit" value="Submit">
</form>

Validating the form submission

Before sending the form data to the admin of site, it is necessary to validate the data. For example, if a user simply hits the "Submit" button, without entering any information, empty email will be sent to the admin. Another example is the use of fake email address in the "email address" field.

We should place some PHP code in contact-form-handler.php that should validate the data. If the data is not valid, user should be redirected to "email-contact-form.html" again, so that he must enter the correct information. If the data is valid, then email should be sent to admin.

Below is the PHP code that will check the data of all fields of contact form. The email address field will be checked for the proper syntax. This code will also check if "name", "postal address" and "message" fields contain some data or not. In case of empty data or wrong email syntax, an error message will be displayed on the screen with a link back to "email-contact-form.html".

<?php
$error_occured = "no";
$name = $_POST['name']; // getting the value of name
$email_address = $_POST['email']; // getting the value of email address
$postal_address = $_POST['postal_address']; // getting the value of postal address
$message = $_POST['message']; // getting the value of user message

////////////////// Data Validation ////////////////
if(empty($name)) {
$error_occured = "yes";
echo "Error: You have NOT entered your name. Please click on BACK button of your browser and correct this error to proceed.";
}

if (!eregi("^[_a-z0-9-]+(\.[_a-z0-9-]+)*@[a-z0-9-]+(\.[a-z0-9-]+)*(\.[a-z]{2,3})$", $email_address)){
$error_occured = "yes";
echo "Error: You have NOT entered the correct email address. Please click on BACK button of your browser and correct this error to proceed.";
}
if(empty($postal_address)) {
$error_occured = "yes";
echo "Error: You have NOT entered your postal address. Please click on BACK button of your browser and correct this error to proceed.";
}

if(empty($message)) {
$error_occured = "yes";
echo "Error: You have NOT entered your message. Please click on BACK button of your browser and correct this error to proceed.";
}

?>


This code is getting the form values in PHP variables and validating them. The form values are extracted from the POST array, because we had set the "method=POST" while defining the form.

After getting the form values, we have defined a variable "$error_occured". The value of this variable is "no" in start. In case any error occurs, its value is changed to "yes". We shall check the value of this variable before sending the email. If the value is "yes", then email will not be sent and the user will be returned to previous page.

We have used the PHP's empty() function to check if the variable is empty. For validating the email address, regular expression(eregi("^[_a-z0-9-]+(\.[_a-z0-9-]+)*@[a-z0-9-]+(\.[a-z0-9-]+)*(\.[a-z]{2,3})$) is used. This expression is checking the syntax of the email address entered.

Emailing the form data using PHP

<?php
if($error_occured=="no") {

$to = "AdminEmailAddress@example.com";
$email_from = $email_address;
$email_subject = "New Message For you";
$email_body = "You have received a new message. Here are the details: Name = " . $name . ", Postal Address = " . $postal_address . ", Message = ". $message;
$headers = "From: $email_from";

mail($to,$email_subject,$email_body,$headers);
}
?>


In the above code we have defined the variables that are required to send the email. This piece of code is starting with an "if" condition. Here we are checking the values of the variable, "$error_occured". If value is "no", then it means that there were no errors and the email will be sent. If the value is "yes", then it means that there were some errors. In this case, the email will not be sent and user will be simply asked to correct the errors.

"$to" is holding the email address at which the email will be sent.
"$email_from" is holding the email address of the user who has submitted the form.
"$email_subject" is holding the subject of the email that will be sent.
"$email_body" is holding the actual message that will sent in email. It is containing the name, postal address and actual message of user.
"$headers" is holding the information for use in the mail() function. This is holding the email address of sender.
The last line is the mail function that is using the above info and sending the email to the site admin.

Download the code for the contact form

There are two files in the zip file. One is "email-contact-form.html". It is holding the simple HTML contact form with a submit button. The other page is "contact-form-handler.php". This is the PHP page that is getting the data, validating the data, reporting the errors (if any) and sending the email.

Why to have a contact form?

Related pages

• PHP form tutorial


• PHP Form to email sample


• Secure your HTML contact form using captcha


• Email form with file attachment in PHP