Luxa SMTP
Luxa SMTP

Luxa SMTP − Send WordPress Emails to the Inbox

Luxa SMTP

Luxa SMTP is a free WordPress plugin that replaces the default, unauthenticated wp_mail() transport with a real, authenticated SMTP connection. Password resets, order confirmations, contact form replies, and every other email WordPress sends go out through a provider that’s actually trusted to deliver — instead of quietly landing in spam because the hosting server’s default mail function has no authentication at all.

It’s built as a clean, honest free plugin: everything below is included at no cost, with no artificial limits nudging you toward a paid tier. A separate Pro add-on (Backup Connection, Failure Alerts, Resend From Log, Export CSV/XLSX) exists for teams who want more, but the free plugin is a complete, production-ready tool on its own.

Requires: WordPress 6.2+, PHP 7.4+ License: GPLv2 or later

Features

  • Authenticated SMTP, any provider — username/password auth with TLS or SSL, hooked directly into PHPMailer via the standard phpmailer_init action.
  • One-click provider presets — Gmail, Outlook/365, Yahoo, SendGrid, Mailgun, and Amazon SES auto-fill the correct host, port, and encryption; a “Custom SMTP” option covers everything else.
  • Built-in test-email tool — send a real test message from wp-admin and see the raw SMTP debug conversation if it fails, instead of guessing which setting is wrong.
  • Full email log, not a paywalled preview — every send (success or failed) is recorded with recipient, subject, status, and error details; filterable by status, with automatic cleanup after a configurable retention period.
  • Password encrypted at rest — OpenSSL AES-256-CBC, keyed off the site’s own AUTH_KEY/AUTH_SALT, not the plain base64 encoding some SMTP plugins still ship with.
  • Debug log — an internal, capability-gated technical log (?lxs_debug=1) separate from the email log, useful when troubleshooting the plugin itself rather than a specific send.
  • Clean uninstall by default — settings and log data are kept unless the site owner explicitly opts in to “Delete data on uninstall”; nothing is wiped by accident.
  • Standard WordPress admin UI — a plain, native-looking settings screen (no custom dashboard chrome required to use the plugin fully); an optional richer layout is available if the Pro add-on is installed.
  • Built for extension — developer-facing filters (lxs_settings_tabs, lxs_available_addons, lxs_sanitize_settings, lxs_maillog_insert_data, lxs_log_row_actions, lxs_log_bulk_actions, lxs_menu_title_suffix) let add-ons extend the plugin without editing a single core file.

Changelog

2026-07-12 — Luxa SMTP 1.2.0 Extended the email log’s database table with optional columns (email body, headers, attachments) and a new lxs_maillog_insert_data filter, so a Pro add-on can opt a site into storing full email content for later resending — off by default, core never populates these columns on its own. Added an “Actions” column and a bulk-actions area to the Email Log page, both extensible via new filters for add-ons like Resend From Log and Export CSV/XLSX.

2026-07-12 — Luxa SMTP 1.1.1 Added a lxs_menu_title_suffix filter so an installed Pro add-on can show a small badge next to “Luxa SMTP” in the wp-admin sidebar menu. No visible change without Pro installed.

2026-07-12 — Luxa SMTP 1.1.0 Reworked the admin layout into a pluggable Shell system: the free plugin now ships a plain, native WordPress-style settings screen (PlainShell) instead of a custom dashboard chrome, with a service-container hook (lxs_services_registered) letting an add-on swap in a richer layout. Added a dismissible “enjoying the plugin?” notice pointing to Pro (shown once, only after a week of use, never during an error state). Added a per-add-on enable/disable switch on a new “Add-ons” page, so a Pro add-on’s individual features can be turned on or off independently of the license itself. Added a versioned database migration scaffold and an automated test suite for the plugin’s core logic.

2026-07-12 — Luxa SMTP 1.0.0 Initial release under the LuxaPress brand. Authenticated SMTP sending with six provider presets, a built-in test-email tool with SMTP debug output, a full success/failed email log with filtering and automatic retention cleanup, and OpenSSL-based encryption for the stored SMTP password (replacing the base64 encoding used in an earlier, pre-LuxaPress version of this plugin).