Literally the first thing I run when setting up a new WP install is Scott Riley’s Configure SMTP plugin: going to WP-Plugins, finding it, installing it — and see if I successfully can send that test email.
What Makes This WP-Plugin so Great?
Such a simple and great plugin, using it for years, and I have done WP since the early 2000s on hundreds of installs! Cannot praise enough.
It’s Google’s Fault If Some People See Cannot Send Test Email Errors
And hey, for those of you who are wondering, Configure SMTP does work, always has and continues to do so even if there haven’t been any current updates (turns out, they’re not really needed).
However, there have been extra hurdles set up on Google’s part lately, so if you haooen to use Gmail for sending that test email that some people report as “not working” in other reviews, then that’s not the Plugin’s but Google’s fault, as these a**ho**s don’t like to be scraped or accessed freely — while they, on the other hand, make it a habit (and their business) to crawl, scrape and be a pest all over the internet in order to free-load and rake in billions in (hence) ill-gotten profits in the process. Just saying…
Summing Up
Anyway, for anything normal and running standards-compliant SMTP servers (i e other than Gmail) the Configure SMTP plugin is still as fantastic as it always was!
Highly recommended.
Editor’s Note: if anyone is still insisting to run their WP emails through Gmail and they get that Error while sending test email, there are other specialized plugins for you out there that have been adapted to Google’s being extra-picky — in that case, try one of those.