Home>Support>Contact Form widget now sending unrendered HTML in email

Contact Form widget now sending unrendered HTML in email

By AustinIS, 2 years ago. Last reply by Andrew Misplon, 2 years ago.

Ever since a recent plugin update (now at version 2.16.14), the SiteOrigin Contact Form widget now sends unrendered HTML, whereas it did not do that before the update.

Example email:

"<strong>From:</strong> <a href="mailto:[email protected]">Sender Name</a> <[email protected]>
<strong>Message:</strong>
Test message."

Any ideas, anyone?

This is our free support forum. Replies can take several days. If you need fast email support, please purchase a SiteOrigin Premium license.

  1. 2 years, 2 months ago AustinIS

    Addendum: this forum seems to have rendered the HTML, but that’s not how it appears as an email, either viewed via webmail in Web browsers and email clients.

    Here’s how it looks when received in an email:

  2. 2 years, 2 months ago Andrew Misplon
    Hi, I Work Here

    Hi Austin

    Thanks for getting in touch.

    I’ve added code tags around your markup above. The forum doesn’t support email attachments but you can upload images to your Media Library or any online source of your choosing. Dropbox, Imgur.com, or WeTransfer are options.

    Is the issue persisting with your form? I’ve tried to replicate but haven’t had any luck.

  3. 2 years, 2 months ago AustinIS

    Thank you for the reply. Yes, the problem persists.

    The code you showed above is not exactly correct. Here is what it actually looks like:

    <strong>From:</strong> <a href="mailto:[email protected]">Your Name</a> <[email protected]> 


<strong>Message:</strong>

This is the message.
  4. 2 years, 2 months ago Andrew Misplon
    Hi, I Work Here

    Hi Austin

    Thanks for the update. Which client or online provider is the email being read in? Are you able to check the email in more than one location/program?

  5. 2 years, 2 months ago AustinIS

    Again, this comments section is stripping out some of the HTML. Here’s a link to a screenshot of what the emails look like:

    https://www.icloud.com/iclouddrive/052wp0_uAR-ZdtobA3cA6X3_A#Screen_Shot_2022-06-23_at_12.43.44_PM

    Email provider is Zoho, but SMTP is provided by Amazon Web Services Simple Email Service (AWS SES). I actually suspect AWS SES, as it’s currently running in “Sandbox Mode.”

  6. 2 years, 2 months ago Andrew Misplon
    Hi, I Work Here

    Thanks. The tests I ran earlier today also used SES as the SMTP provider. Does your server offer PHP Mail? If so, could you perhaps switch over to PHP Mail for a quick comparison test? That’ll help us isolate where the issue is. If you’re hosted with Digital Ocean or similar then this won’t be possible.

  7. 2 years, 2 months ago AustinIS

    Server is “self-hosted” on AWS LightSail, and email is being sent by the WP SMTP plugin. I could probably use php mail, but it needs to be configured first. I’ll let you know if I do that, and whether it makes a difference.

  8. 2 years, 2 months ago Andrew Misplon
    Hi, I Work Here

    If PHP Mail isn’t set up; no worries. Thanks for the info. A quick test to help us isolate the issue might be to install Contact Form 7 plugin, insert a form and see if the result is similar. If you’re up for it…

Replies on this thread are closed. Please create a new thread if you have a question, or purchase a SiteOrigin Premium license if you need one-on-one email support.

Get The Most Out of SiteOrigin with SiteOrigin Premium

Find Out More