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/ SAR Friendly SMTP

SAR Friendly SMTP

By Samuel Aguilera

Communication & Messaging / Transactional Email

Reviewed by Abdul Hameid

Trusted WordPress expert with 20+ years of experience evaluating plugins for the WP ecosystem.

SAR Friendly SMTP Review - In-Depth Analysis

A friendly SMTP plugin for WordPress that uses native WordPress capabilities. It avoids third-party libraries and respects modifications made by other plugins.

Performance Overview

WPS Score

6.96/10

User Rating

4.6/5 (based on 46+ reviews)

Active Installations

2,000+

Update Frequency

Below Average It is calculated using the weighted average of same category plugins.

Security Score

1 / 10 (Very Low Risk) It is calculated using the weighted average of all versions.

What It Does

This SMTP plugin is designed to be simple and effective. Unlike many other SMTP plugins that rely on third-party libraries, this one uses WordPress's core functionality. This ensures better compatibility and fewer issues.

It respects the fields modified by other plugins, such as Gravity Forms, ensuring that your email functionality remains intact. You can also enable a debug mode to log communication between WordPress and your SMTP server.

With a user-friendly settings page that utilizes the WordPress settings API, this plugin is secure by default. It also allows non-administrator users to access the settings page if needed, thanks to custom capabilities.

Comparing to Alternatives

SAR Friendly SMTP is a lightweight SMTP plugin that focuses on simplicity and reliability, making it a solid choice among many SMTP plugins available for WordPress.

Top alternatives

Strengths

Extremely lightweight with a small file size (around 38kB).
Simple and straightforward setup with minimal configuration needed.
Reliable email delivery, including HTML emails via SMTP.
No ads or forced upsells, providing a clean user experience.
Good compatibility with various hosting environments and SMTP servers.

Weaknesses

Lacks advanced features found in bulkier SMTP plugins.
No built-in email logging or detailed delivery reports.
No pro version or premium support options available.
Limited customization options compared to some competitors.

User Sentiment Analysis

With a high rating of 4.6 out of 5 from 46 reviews and a majority of 5-star ratings, users appreciate the plugin's simplicity and reliability. There are no recorded negative reviews, indicating strong user satisfaction.

Positive highlights

'Simple & good, straight action plugin' – seofreelance
'With this plugin, it just WORKED' – jschoellen
'Perfect and tiny in size... just awesome' – Joseph
'Super lightweight. Just does the job!' – mahyulan
'It is clean and simple plugin. It does what is needed without annoying ads.' – sayginer

Common complaints

Weaknesses

Limited advanced features and customization.
No email logging or detailed reporting.
No premium support or pro version available.

Who Should Use This?

Best for

Users who want a simple, lightweight SMTP plugin that reliably sends emails without unnecessary features or bloat.

Not ideal for

Users who need advanced email logging, detailed delivery reports, or premium support options might find this plugin too basic for their needs.

Pricing & Value

Free version includes

The free version includes all core SMTP functionality needed to send emails reliably via SMTP with a minimal and clean interface.

Final Verdict

SAR Friendly SMTP stands out for its simplicity, reliability, and lightweight design, making it an excellent choice for users who want hassle-free SMTP email sending without extra features. Its high user ratings and lack of security vulnerabilities reinforce its trustworthiness and effectiveness.

However, users seeking advanced features like email logging, detailed analytics, or premium support may need to consider other alternatives. Overall, it offers great value as a straightforward SMTP solution with no hidden costs or upsells.

Other Notable Features

Here are a few other notable features of this free SAR Friendly SMTP plugin.

SMTP plugin

Email notifications

WordPress SMTP

FAQ

This plugin is just a way to tell WordPress something like: “Please dear WordPress, use my SMTP server to send the emails, not the web server.”

That means that this plugin doesn’t send you emails, when the plugin is enabled WordPress sends your emails using your SMTP server.

If you’re having trouble sending your emails, you can activate the debug mode in settings page. That activates the logging of the commands and data between WordPress and your SMTP server, and most of the time you will find useful information in your PHP error_log file.

Remember to turn off Debug Mode when you’re done with the troubleshooting to avoid raising your server load by generating unnecessary logs.

Since version 1.1 you can do this. Below you can see an example of use.

define( 'SAR_FSMTP_USER', 'your_username' ); define( 'SAR_FSMTP_PASSWORD', 'your_password' ); define( 'SAR_FSMTP_HOST', 'smtp.example.com' ); // IMPORTANT! Don't use quotes for the SAR_FSMTP_PORT value! define( 'SAR_FSMTP_PORT', 587 ); define( 'SAR_FSMTP_ENCRYPTION', 'tls' ); // These two are optional. SAR_FSMTP_FROM must be a valid email according to is_email() WP core function. define( 'SAR_FSMTP_FROM', '[email protected]' ); define( 'SAR_FSMTP_FROM_NAME', 'Your Name' );

In 1.2 the following constants are added too:

define( 'SAR_FSMTP_DEBUG_MODE', 'error_log' ); define( 'SAR_FSMTP_ALLOW_INVALID_SSL', 'on' );

This is useful if you want to use the same settings network-wide in a WordPress network (multisite installation).

Contributors and developers

“SAR Friendly SMTP” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.

Samuel Aguilera

Free Version Docs

WPS

6.96

Average

Ratings

4.6 out of 5 | 46

Version

1.2.6

Last updated

3 months ago

Active installations

2,000+

WordPress version

7.0.7 or higher

PHP version

7.0 or higher

Languages

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SAR Friendly SMTP Review - In-Depth Analysis

Performance Overview

What It Does

Comparing to Alternatives

User Sentiment Analysis

Who Should Use This?

Pricing & Value

Final Verdict

Other Notable Features

FAQ

Contributors and developers

Ratings

Reviews (46)

Sort by:

Contributors & Developers

Interested in development?

Changelog

Security Status

Secure

No Unpatched Vulnerabilities

Known Vulnerabilities (0)

Previous Versions

WPS

6.96

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