How to send text messages for free using Python | Use Python to send text messages via email
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- Опубликовано: 16 сен 2024
- Using SMS and MMS gateways we can send text messages to phones from a computer via email. With this strategy, we can use a combination of the Python SMTP and email library to send text messages programmatically for free! This not only includes short text messages, but also multimedia messages with pictures, videos, or any file! This can be super helpful when you want to send yourself notifications for your Python projects.
Code: www.alfredoseq...
👨💻 I made this into a python module if you don't want to write the code yourself: github.com/alf...
📱 Follow me on social: alfredo.lol/so...
#python #text #twilio
Gear:
📷 Canon EOS Rebel T7i
💻 Intel i7 XPS 13 16GB RAM (Arch Linux)
Code for this project: www.alfredosequeida.com/blog/how-to-send-text-messages-for-free-using-python-use-python-to-send-text-messages-via-email/
I recently found this site, which has SMS gateways for multiple countries, which might be helpful if you are not in the US: email2sms.info/
Note, if you are following the tutorial, you will notice a function to get a config file using JSON. This is only because I didn't want to show my login info while making the video. You don't need this function.
You can make your code a lot shorter, by installing the package I made for this project.
install: pip install etext
use:
from etext import send_sms_via_email
phone_number = "123-123-1234"
message = "hello world!"
provider = "T-Mobile"
sender_credentials = ("email@gmail.com", "email_password")
send_sms_via_email(
phone_number, message, provider, sender_credentials, subject="sent using etext"
)
You can see the documentation for this module here: github.com/AlfredoSequeida/etext
My work made easier Thank you
@@ACodingWoof any time ;)
config.json ???
json.load() ? load() missing 1 required positional argument: 'fp'
Boy a Mira todos tus tutorials as en español # ( gracias )#*
I have been around the internet for a week and this is the clearest description with a great step by step. Thanks.
Thanks!
What an excellent tutorial, it’s educational & concise! Thank you for this, every other tutorial uses a paid API but this one does it for free!
Thank you! I'm glad it was useful!
Thank you Alfredo, this saved me a ton of time creating a notifier for changes to my dynamic DNS.
I'm glad you found it useful!
Hi Alfredo - thank you so much for your informative video! I learned so much and successfully sent my 1st text via email! Appreciate you bro. Keep up the good work!
Glad to hear it!
Hi. What's the phone carrier that did you test? I want to try this solution but I'm afraid to buy a phone number that doesn't work
You are THE MAN. Very nice delivery of information
Thank you 🔥🔥🔥
Excellent tutorial! Very easy to understand even for inexperienced coders, but not boring for an advanced developer. Well done, sir.
Thanks!
Totorial was mint bro, nice number leak lol and code works amazing even wit non US providers
Thank you, lol.
Great...Video...As Usually...I have question..do Indian Service Provider Also provide such service...
Thank you, unfortunately I don't have an answer to your question.
How would u have the person u send the text to be able to react to the text, and do something depending on what they react?
It works both ways, you can reply to the message you receive and you can see that reply in your email inbox. So it would just be a matter of writing the code to check for that email and perform some action. This might be a good idea for a follow-up video 🤔.
@@AlfredoSequeida ABSOLUTELY
Can we colpaborate on that?
I have some ideas.....
I AM an "Advanced Beginner", lol
With some Cool Collaboration Tools....
Just let me know, I'm all in during the DAY.
@@SolidBuildersInc I would love to, but unfortunately, my time is limited right now and will be for a few more months (which is why I haven't been posting).
Hi Alfredo, with this method, you will need to know the receiver carrier?
Nice Work! Imma try this later
🔥🔥🔥
I can't run the script to test the API
However I installed all the modules and created the files
=> providers.py
=> etext.py
=> exceptions.py
=> sms.py
and I copied their content.
I receive
ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'etext
You don't no need to create any of those files if you are using the etext module. Just install it using pip. If you're having trouble with the installation, watch this: ruclips.net/video/ci8FvBSIl4Y/видео.html
What you showed here, the message you got, was in an Email app. This is not a text message to a phone number, this is just an Email. I don't get why they need the phone number for this, that's just dumb since you can just send en actual Email to the same app that you showed here, and it's more simplier. Makes no sense.
If you're referring to the message I showed on my phone when I sent the email to the sms gateway - that application is my sms app, not an email app. The phone number is necessary so that the receiver receives the message on their phone. Sending an email to a domain name ie: 'somename@domain.com' will not yield the same results since you won't get the message via sms, but rather via email.
Im a super beginner and been trying to figure this out for 2 days. I’m going to try this. Thank you for explaining this. Is there a way to do this all at once to multiple numbers? I have about 20 diff messages to send
Definitely, use a loop, something along the lines of:
numbers = [12312312,123123,123123123,123123123]
for number in numbers:
call_the_sms_function(params, number, etc)
is it still working ? i couldn't get it to work ! no errors, we used email and App password that we have created, correct? is there is anything else in the code that we need to change ? any way to debug errors ?
Just tested it, still works
If you're sending and not receiving any errors it might be your phone/email provider not allowing the message. If you look at the comments here you might find work arounds.
How many people kept watching to the end just to see if he corrected the "smpt_port" variable name?
Hey Alredo!
Thank you for the cool video. I am getting stuck in the sender credentials tuple. Is this stored somewhere else? What would be the overall structure of this tuple? Thank you
In the video, I stored it outside of the file to keep my credentials private from those watching the video. However, that's not necessary. The tuple looks like this:
("email@email.com", "password")
Was looking for something like this. Is this usa only
That's a good question, I spent some time looking for sms gateways for other providers and I found some for Canada, but I had trouble with other countries. However, as long as you can find the sms gateway and it supports email, then you should be able to do it.
Don't know if it's a problem at my end but i used laravel php for this and its showing number for At&t gateway for from instead of my email
Do you mean the receiving message on a phone shows up as a message from a phone number?
@@AlfredoSequeida yes
I haven't seen that before, maybe AT&T's gateway uses a number to forward sms messages.
What are the step by step instructions for Jupyter notebook. Everything in the video makes sense except for putting them both in the same directory . When attempting to operate in the same notebook but different cells I have a error message in regards to provider. ModuleNotFoundError Traceback (most recent call last)
I'm not familiar with jupyter notebook, but that error implies you're missing one of the dependencies. It would be helpful to see the full error.
Anyone have any idea why the text part of the MMS goes through but not the multi media? I set this up to send an audio file (mp3) and I can see that my email is sending the audio file but when I text my phone (At&T) no audio file, just text. I am using MMS code not SMS, my subtype is mpeg and main type is audio. Any help?
Two things that come to mind 1) make sure the path to the file is correct (try using the full absolute path) 2) check to see if at&t has any restrictions on what can be sent. Someone told me that you can block email to SMS on at&t via their customer web portal. So see if it's maybe not enabled for MMS.
i also had this issue, it is probably your attachment size. For AT&T, it's 1MB max for attachments.
Which provide we should use it it India and please tell use how can use it as module that you given in your description
I'm not familiar with India's phone providers, so I don't know how that would work. However, if you can find SMS email gateways for your provider, then it should work. You can find the module along with documentation here: github.com/AlfredoSequeida/etext/
Great vid and explaination bro, can i just modify the Providers file and add a few of my region specific providers after installation and still expect it to work?
Thank you! Yes, that should work.
How would you write this to send a message to multiple people? For loop on the number variable?
Yes, with maybe a sleep after each send so your email provider does not mark it as outgoing spam.
@@AlfredoSequeida I've also noticed verizon numbers don't work I even did it manually through my email and the phones don't receive texts. Have you come across this?
@@rantun6393 I don't believe I have tried any verizon #s, I would check if any other gateway addresses exist. Also I know tmobile users have the option to disallow sms via email in their user dashboard, so verizon could have a similar feature.
Does this apply to any providers? Or only certain numbers have to follow specific providers?
This applies to any provider that has an email to sms gateway.
Thanks for the video. The problem is that Gmail will block/suspend your account if you use it for texting through the Gmail. I use to do this 2 years ago and sent only 3 similar texts through Gmail one time, and Gmail suspended my account without giving me a reason. My texts were only about a cooking tip to my friend. I didn't even send it as a group text LOL So be careful with Gmail. Also the other problem is that AT&T blocks most texts coming from emails. If you can find a work around all these problems, let me know plz.
Thank you for the information! I personally haven't been blocked/suspended for sending text messages this way, but it's good to know that it can happen. As for AT&T, I know T-mobile has a feature that lets you enable/block incoming email messages, so if you're trying to send messages to yourself, check to see if AT&T has a similar feature. For T-mobile, you can find this feature in the web control panel for your account.
How do I get it to work with a UK phone number?
You will need to find sms gateways for the UK providers (assuming any exist). Search online. If they do exist, they should not be too hard to find.
Would there be a way to modify this application so that it could bcc multiple people?
Definitely, you just need to add the code for it.
Hey Alfredo, is there a way to send without knowing the providers?
Unfortunately not without looking up the phone # (to find the provider), which costs money. However, a while ago, I had the idea of just sending the message to all providers. This would mean some don't get sent, and the one that is correct will. However, it also increases the chance of providers marking your email address as spam.
I've answered this in more detail before here: github.com/AlfredoSequeida/etext/issues/3#issuecomment-1023376507
Bruh I need to send sms to US to my clients as a reminder can you help me with that
Did you follow the tutorial?
@@AlfredoSequeida can I have your number to discuss with you about it
If somebody know how to get the French sms gateways that'd be great
does these work if the receiver is offline
I don't know, but I would imagine the message would be treated like any other SMS message, so I'm inclined to think it will work.
How did you set up the config file
It's not necessary, but here is some python documentation. Essentially, the config file is a json file with the data you want. Then you read the file and parse the json data
docs.python.org/3/library/json.html
Hey Alfredo, thanks for the great tutorial and code. I have the code working but got Username and password not accepted error. Also went to App Password on google and it says "The setting you are looking for is not available for your account." Any ideas? Thanks
I'm getting an SMTPlib authentication error when I try to use this code for SMS messaging. I'm not using the config.json as you have it in the video, but I am typing the credentials in directly instead. I triple-checked and the credentials are correct.
What's the error? Also, if you are using Gmail, you will need to setup an app password.
@@AlfredoSequeida that was the problem! GMail requires an app password and making one and using it instead fixed my issue. Thanks!
thank you for the video!
You're welcome!
I'm not sure if you're still keeping up with this video but when I attempt to run the code I get an error of:
AttributeError: module 'Sending.PROVIDERS' has no attribute 'get'
I'm pretty new to python and I'm unsure of what needs to be done here.
So the .get() function is meant to work with a dictionary object, which in or case if PROVIDERS. So, I'm curious to know what `Sending` is you your case. Show me the like of code that you are getting the error with and how you imported the PROVIDERS dictionary.
I figured out the problem here! so when I copy/pasted the code for providers, I named the .py file PROVIDERS (all upper case) and the syntax wasn't sure what to do. After renaming the file to providers, the code worked great. Just curious, is there any way for this to work the other way? Send a text back through my email and have it execute code so I could essentially create an interface through text?
@@ninjaman570 Glad to hear you got it to work. Yes, if you reply to the message you get on your phone, you will receive that message in your email. So if you want to somehow catch a response, you can check your emails periodically (or use some sort of hook) to catch any messages you receive and perform an action.
@@AlfredoSequeida I reply on my phone to the text and I’m not receiving an email. I’m using gmail, and an iPhone. It’s texting through iMessage, so you think that could cause it not to work?
@@ninjaman570 I'm not completely sure. But I can tell you that I have tested replying back and it works on my Android phone. Just Incase you didn't check this already - try the spam folder.
THANKS MAN
Is there any parameter to add to the code to make the sending faster ?
The speed for sending/receiving messages is dependent on your email provider. So there isn't much you would be able to accomplish by changing the code.
what is limit per day to send email to text this way ?
It depends on your email provider and the type of account. For example, I believe that Gmail has a limit of 500 emails per day for free accounts via their web interface and 100 emails per day for external clients. I believe that this would count as an external client, so I would guess 100 emails per day would be the limit for free Gmail accounts. On the other hand, If I recall, paid workspace accounts can go up to 10,000 emails per day.
Excellent Content - I'm seeing a similar issue that others have had - where there was a delay in the email hitting the sent box of my email vs when it actually sent to my text messages. Do you know if there is any solution on this? So far, I've only tested a few - but I'm seeing like ~10 minute delay for the sms message to come through
Thank you! Unfortunately, I don't have a solution for this, I think it's just up to the gateway to decide when they want to deliver the queued message.
Google does not seem to have App Password anymore. Would it work with Passkey?
App password is still available: myaccount.google.com/apppasswords
can i send a message from US to nigeria
Yes, as long as you have the sms gateway.
Hi, thank you for this tutorial it is very helpful, I am having the issue that it does send and I can see it in my email but it says that the email couldn't be delivered because the domain doesn't exist, I'm using cricket sms domain if that helps. I triple checked that the number is correct also, please let me know if you know anything that could fix this.
The only think I can think of is you might have the wrong domain / gateway. If i recall, cricket uses att's network. So try using att's gateway. Otherwise, see if you can find a different domain/gateway for cricket's network.
Hi, Olive. What's the phone carrier that did you test? You did it after it? I want to try this solution but I'm afraid to buy a phone number that doesn't work.
First here!😁
🔥🔥🔥
Boss please can we integrate it and send it through php
Yes, you just need to re write the logic in php or call the python script from your php program.
I think this method working only for usa and canada provider
It should also work anywhere where a phone provider has an email SMS gateway setup. Here is a list of SMS gateways you can look at filtered by county. email2sms.info/
Great video and very well explained. I did implement and received all my emails into GMail, but only got one text message to come through. Do you have any idea what may be happening ? I thought maybe a cron job from GMail, but nothing seems to be happening after the success of the 1st. I sent about 5 or so and they went to GMail nicely. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
I'm glad you enjoyed the video! One thing that might be worth checking out is your provider's spam policies. If your provider thinks that the email message is spam, the text might not be received on your end. I know T-Mobile has a feature in their web portal that let's you block incoming email messages, so maybe your carrier has something similar that was enabled automatically if it detected spam. If possible, try not to send too many messages at once, that could also raise some spam flags. One more thing you can try is a different email address just to make sure that your carrier is not specifically blocking that email. I hope that helps!
@@AlfredoSequeida
Thanks for the tip.
1st - The emails did start pouring in through the night, so I would not use this for certain types of production processes, like "Just In Time Delivery", but would be great for lightweight reporting, surveying and marketing.
2nd - I had another issue that was observed and that was the ......"attachment was removed" message was in the received text message with no attachment. Have you come across this challenge?
3rd - I know there is a library called "phonenumber" that offers the ability to obtain the carrier name of a number programmatically instead of a lookup from the providers.py file with a variable input.
Have you considered trying something like this and if so, what was your experience? Here is a great link I found after writing up this response, lol - I will be looking into this myself stackabuse.com/validating-and-formatting-phone-numbers-in-python/
Carriers in the U.S. appear to be guarding that meta data, but maybe a test could be run to get a 200 code using a ping before sending the email. This way we don't need the receiver to provide the carrier they are using. One less thing to put on the end user to be a solution.
Thanks again
@Davis Rogers 1) It's good to know that you at the very least did receive something. I personally have not experienced delays when sending messages in the past. But I know you're not the only one that has experienced this issue, which is why I plan on making another video with a more reliable solution based on push notifications using data instead of SMS (also free of course). I just haven't had the time to get to that.
2) Also, unfortunately, I also have not come across a scenario where any sent attachments have been removed I'm curious to know if you have kind of filters set up on your phone that would prevent attachments that might be recognized as "phishing attempts" (because of the unusual way of sending the message via email).
3) That's really interesting! As far as I was aware, in the US you need to pay money to get access to that data. Twilio has a service that lets you get the carrier of a number, but for a fee. For a bit, I looked around to see if I could figure out how they were doing that, but I didn't find a solution. It might be interesting to look at the source code for phonenumber to see if we can figure out something for that. As of now, the best solution I have to NOT have to put the carrier information is to send multiple messages in a loop to all of the carriers in the list. Something like:
for provider in PROVIDERS:
send_sms_via_email(...all the params, provider)
And then check which ones did NOT fail. This way you can get a better idea of the carrier. But this would likely need to be a one-time thing and then the carrier would need to be saved to prevent your email address from being marked as spam.
If you do figure something out, consider submitting any code changes to the git repo, I have had a few people asking the same question before.
@@AlfredoSequeida I think I found a solution to explore. Can I share it over What'sApp or email ?
@@SolidBuildersInc definitely, feel free to email me alfredosequeida01@gmail.com
App passwords aren't available for my account. Help pls
You need to enable 2FA first..go to security in your google account window and enable 2FA after that when u go to security again there should be a third option for app passwords
I would try what Aditya said.
hii bro , am from india , how can i use this service ?
does it work in our country also?
if you can find sms gateways for your phone providers it should work.
How do I message several people?
Use a loop where the phone number and carrier changes with every call to the sms or mms function.
So for example you can do something like this
people_to_message = {"123123123": "AT&T", "222222222": "T-Mobile"}
message = "hello!"
sender_creds = ("email@email.com", "password")
for number, carrier in people_to_message.items():
# call your sms or mms function
send_sms_via_email(number, message, carrier, sender_creds)
@@AlfredoSequeida Thank you man! I used for i in range(length of numbers list) and cycled would cycle through each provider and number with i. But this looks way more efficient snd clean. Thank you!
brother , Will this program send email or SMS ?
Both, it uses sms gateways to send sms messages via email.
Which provider do you use if you're in India?
I don't know, I had trouble finding sms gateways for counties other than the US.
Is there Sms email gateway in philippines
Unfortunately, I don't know. You can try searching online or ask a Philippino provider for information.
GOAT
🙏🙏🙏
Thank you so much ,
You're welcome!
hi sir. how can i integrate this to a python gui program? thank you sir. 😀
That's a broad question, but in general - just like you would integrate any other code.
@@AlfredoSequeida is your program is dependent on the net?
@@jfGAGO if by "net" you mean internet access, then yes. Since the program uses email to send sms messages, internet access is required.
Hi, amazing video. So the provider list matches the receiver number correct?
Thank you! Yes, the carrier/provider should be that of the number you are sending the message to (receiver).
Can I hide the email and mask it as a number?
Well I don't know if you can mask an email address, but if you want to send anonymous messages, you could just use a throwaway email address just for sending texts.
If possible then give reply sir, making this for college project
@@AlfredoSequeida no just wanted to make it look better
would verizon charge me for these text messages?
If you're talking about sending the messages - no, this method is free since all you're doing is sending an email. But depending on the receiver's phone plan, they might be charged (like any other phone plan).
@@AlfredoSequeida sweet thanks!
bro WHAT YOU THINKS ABOUT INDIA??
I don't understand the question. Are you asking what I think about India's culture?
Help get this tool boss I don't know how to code please can help? Does this send bulk sms ?
I replied to your other post
@@AlfredoSequeida which post ?
please, how can i find my sms email
If you're taking about the sms gateway domain, the github repo has a list of US sms providers in providers.py. if you're not in the US, then you might find them by doing a Google search for sms gateways for your provider.
@@AlfredoSequeida i did a search but found nothing for my provider free mobile
@@boostmind-1606 it's possible that there is none. If your provider is a subsidiary of another provider, you can also try to use the gateway for the main provider. Unfortunately this method only works if you can find the sms gateway.
@@AlfredoSequeida ok i understand , thanks
Where did you find gateway urls for providers?
I just found them by searching online. Here is a useful website that I found recently email2sms.info/ . It has a list of gateways for different countries.
link website is blank
What website?
Please give config.neon file
I'm not sure what that is.
You're boosting programming broo l needs help you to fast on the video haha or am to slow
What do you need help with?
KAREN!!!
:)
Help me out
What do you need help with?
does this work in africa?
If you can find SMS gateways - yes
Bro you're sick
Thank you!
lol
🔥🔥🔥
@@AlfredoSequeida big fan
@@subhammaheswari2956 thanks 😎
Dude, please stop saying "actual" every 5 seconds
Good tutorial though
lol, I guess it's a habit, thank you, I'm glad you liked it.
Please can we connect on whatsapp, or facebook
Feel free to message me.
You are THE MAN. Very nice delivery of information
Thanks!