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htmlemailmailto

mailto: subject= and body= support in email clients

Does anyone know if when sending a html newsletter what kind of support the major email clients have for the subject= and body= parts of the mailto tag?

Solution

  • The behavior varies by both email client and source application. Here's a likely enough example from my own system, using pjp's link.

    <a href="mailto:me@somewhere.com?subject=Hello%20People">Send Mail</a>
    • Mailto link followed within Outlook client successfully fills subject
    • Mailto link followed in IE successfully fills subject for Outlook client
    • Mailto link followed in Firefox fails for same Outlook client (subject text remains part of "TO" field)

    I tried the same link in HTML emails read by gmail and Yahoo web clients.

    • Gmail correctly opens a new message with desired subject
    • Yahoo pre-fills the subject, but truncates at the space ("Hello" only)

    That much variation on just one computer makes embedded mailto tricky to use. I bet that's why many email newsletters provide a "View as a web page" link in the header.