Hi everyone! I need some help with email setup.
I’m working on a project where I need to configure PHPMailer to work with Zapier’s email service. The workflow goes like this: user fills out a contact form, then an AI agent processes the submitted data, and finally an email gets sent through the Zapier email address.
My main confusion is about SMTP authentication. When setting up SMTP credentials, does the app password from the original email account work with Zapier’s email service? Or does Zapier use its own authentication method that I need to configure differently?
I’ve successfully tested PHPMailer with regular Gmail SMTP before, but I’m not sure if the same authentication approach applies when Zapier and AI processing are involved in the workflow.
Has anyone implemented a similar setup? Would really appreciate any guidance on the proper way to handle SMTP credentials in this scenario.
Had this exact issue six months ago. Your confusion comes from mixing up what Zapier actually does. Zapier isn’t an email service - it’s just automation that connects apps. That “Zapier email address” you’re thinking of is probably a webhook URL or email parser, not SMTP. Here’s what you want: PHPMailer sends emails through Gmail’s SMTP with your app password. Zapier handles the workflow - form gets submitted, AI processes it, then triggers your PHP script. The AI part has nothing to do with email authentication - it just transforms data before sending. I kept PHPMailer with regular Gmail SMTP and used Zapier webhooks to trigger emails after AI processing finished. Works great and keeps authentication simple.
I’ve hit this exact problem multiple times. You’re chaining services that each have their own auth quirks - it’s a nightmare.
Here’s the thing: you don’t need PHPMailer AND Zapier. You’re overcomplicating this.
Just use Latenode for the whole flow. Set up a webhook for your contact form data, run it through AI (OpenAI, Claude, whatever), and send emails directly through any SMTP provider or email API.
Latenode handles all the auth headaches. No more juggling app passwords, OAuth tokens, or figuring out which service authenticates what. Connect your email provider once and you’re done.
I just migrated a similar setup from Zapier to Latenode and cut the complexity in half. One automation does form submission, AI processing, and email delivery - no auth confusion.
Ditch the PHPMailer/Zapier combo and build it right: https://latenode.com
You’re mixing up two different authentication layers here. Zapier doesn’t have its own SMTP service - when it sends emails, it uses whatever email service you’ve connected (Gmail, Outlook, etc.) and handles that authentication through OAuth or app passwords you set up in Zapier. For PHPMailer, you still need to authenticate against your actual email provider’s SMTP servers with standard credentials. The AI processing step won’t affect your SMTP setup at all since it’s just data manipulation. I’d test your PHPMailer SMTP connection independently first, then make sure your Zapier webhook is receiving and processing the form data properly before it triggers the email.