Send Email using Hotmail/Live/Outlook/Office365 in Visual C++

In previous section, I introduced how to send email using Yahoo account. In this section, I will introduce how to use your Hotmail/Outlook.com/Office365 account to send email in Visual C++.

Introduction

Hotmail/Live/Outlook.com SMTP server address is smtp.office365.com. It requires explicit SSL (TLS) connection to do user authentication, and you should use your Hotmail/Live/Outlook.com email address as the user name for ESMTP authentication. For example: your email is liveid@hotmail.com, and then the user name should be liveid@hotmail.com.

Server Port SSL/TLS
smtp.office365.com 25, 587 TLS

Note

Remarks: All of samples in this section are based on first section: A simple Visual C++ project. To compile and run the following example codes successfully, please click here to learn how to create the test project and add reference of EASendMail to your project.

[Visual C++ Example - Send email using Hotmail/MSN Live account over TLS connection]

The following example codes demonstrate how to send email using Hotmail/MSN Live account.

Note

To get the full sample projects, please refer to Samples section.

#include "stdafx.h"
#include <tchar.h>
#include <Windows.h>

#include "EASendMailObj.tlh"
using namespace EASendMailObjLib;

const int ConnectNormal = 0;
const int ConnectSSLAuto = 1;
const int ConnectSTARTTLS = 2;
const int ConnectDirectSSL = 3;
const int ConnectTryTLS = 4;

int _tmain(int argc, _TCHAR* argv[])
{
    ::CoInitialize(NULL);

    IMailPtr oSmtp = NULL;
    oSmtp.CreateInstance(__uuidof(EASendMailObjLib::Mail));
    oSmtp->LicenseCode = _T("TryIt");

    // Set your hotmail email address
    oSmtp->FromAddr = _T("liveid@hotmail.com");
    // Add recipient email address
    oSmtp->AddRecipientEx(_T("support@emailarchitect.net"), 0);

    // Set email subject
    oSmtp->Subject = _T("simple email from Visual C++ with hotmail account");
    // Set email body
    oSmtp->BodyText = _T("this is a test email sent from Visual C++ project with hotmail");

    // Hotmail SMTP server address
    oSmtp->ServerAddr = _T("smtp.office365.com");

    // Hotmail user authentication should use your
    // Hotmail email address as the user name.
    oSmtp->UserName = _T("liveid@hotmail.com");

    // If you got authentication error, try to create an app password instead of your user password.
    // https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/account-billing/using-app-passwords-with-apps-that-don-t-support-two-step-verification-5896ed9b-4263-e681-128a-a6f2979a7944
    oSmtp->Password = _T("your password or app password");

    // set 587 port
    oSmtp->ServerPort = 587;

    // detect SSL/TLS automatically.
    oSmtp->ConnectType = ConnectSSLAuto;

    _tprintf(_T("Start to send email via Hotmail account ...\r\n"));

    if(oSmtp->SendMail() == 0)
    {
        _tprintf(_T("email was sent successfully!\r\n"));
    }
    else
    {
        _tprintf(_T("failed to send email with the following error: %s\r\n"),
            (const TCHAR*)oSmtp->GetLastErrDescription());
    }

    return 0;
}

Hotmail SMTP OAUTH

If your account enabled two-factor authentication, you cannot login your account by normal user authentication, you should use SMTP OAUTH or App Password.

Microsoft Live SMTP servers (Hotmail, Oultook personal account) have been extended to support authorization via the industry-standard OAuth 2.0 protocol. Using OAUTH protocol, user can do authentication by Microsoft Web OAuth instead of inputting user and password directly in application.

Microsoft will disable traditional user authentication in the future, switching to Microsoft OAuth (Modern Authentication) is strongly recommended now.

Or you can generate App Passwords and use this app password instead of your user password.

Send Email using Office 365

Office 365 SMTP server uses 587 port and explicit SSL (TLS) connection.

Server Port SSL/TLS
smtp.office365.com 25, 587 (recommended) TLS

App Password and SmtpClientAuthenticationDisabled

If your account enabled two-factor authentication, you cannot login your account by normal user authentication, you should create an App Passwords and use this App Password instead of the user password.

You should also check if authenticated client SMTP submission (SMTP AUTH) is enabled:

Enable or disable authenticated client SMTP submission (SMTP AUTH) in Exchange Online.

[VC++ - Send email using Office 365 over explicit SSL (TLS) on 587 port - Example]

The following example codes demonstrate how to send email using Office 365 in VC++ over TLS 587 port.

Note

To get the full sample projects, please refer to Samples section.

#include "stdafx.h"
#include <tchar.h>
#include <Windows.h>

#include "EASendMailObj.tlh"
using namespace EASendMailObjLib;

const int ConnectNormal = 0;
const int ConnectSSLAuto = 1;
const int ConnectSTARTTLS = 2;
const int ConnectDirectSSL = 3;
const int ConnectTryTLS = 4;

int _tmain(int argc, _TCHAR* argv[])
{
    ::CoInitialize(NULL);

    IMailPtr oSmtp = NULL;
    oSmtp.CreateInstance(__uuidof(EASendMailObjLib::Mail));
    oSmtp->LicenseCode = _T("TryIt");

    //  Your office 365 email address
    oSmtp->FromAddr = _T("myid@mydomain");
    // Add recipient email address
    oSmtp->AddRecipientEx(_T("support@emailarchitect.net"), 0);

    // Set email subject
    oSmtp->Subject = _T("simple email from Visual C++ with office365 account");
    // Set email body
    oSmtp->BodyText = _T("this is a test email sent from Visual C++ project with office365");

    // SMTP server address
    oSmtp->ServerAddr = _T("smtp.office365.com");

    // Office365 user authentication should use your
    // Office365 email address as the user name.
    oSmtp->UserName = _T("myid@mydomain");

    // If you got authentication error, try to create an app password instead of your user password.
    // https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/account-billing/using-app-passwords-with-apps-that-don-t-support-two-step-verification-5896ed9b-4263-e681-128a-a6f2979a7944
    oSmtp->Password = _T("your password or app password");

    // Use 587 port.
    oSmtp->ServerPort = 587;

    // detect SSL/TLS automatically.
    oSmtp->ConnectType = ConnectSSLAuto;

    _tprintf(_T("Start to send email via office365 account ...\r\n"));

    if(oSmtp->SendMail() == 0)
    {
        _tprintf(_T("email was sent successfully!\r\n"));
    }
    else
    {
        _tprintf(_T("failed to send email with the following error: %s\r\n"),
            (const TCHAR*)oSmtp->GetLastErrDescription());
    }

    return 0;
}

Office365 SMTP/EWS/Ms Graph API OAUTH

If your account enabled two-factor authentication, you cannot login your account by normal user authentication, you should use SMTP/EWS/Ms Graph API OAUTH or App Password.

Microsoft will disable traditional user authentication in the future, switching to Microsoft OAuth (Modern Authentication) is strongly recommended now.

Or you can generate App Passwords and use this app password instead of your user password.

Next Section

At next section I will introduce how to send email without specified SMTP server.

Appendix

Comments

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