embedding image in html email

Question

I'm trying to send a multipart/related html email with embedded gif images. This email is generated using Oracle PL/SQL. My attempts have failed, with the image showing up as a red X (in Outlook 2007 and yahoo mail)

I've been sending html emails for some time, but my requirements are now to use several gif images in the email. I can store these on one of our web servers and just link to them, but many users email clients will not show them automatically and will need to either change settings or manually download them for each email.

So, my thoughts are to embed the image. My questions are:

What am I doing wrong here?
Is the embedding approach the correct one?
Any other options if I need to use more and more images? Attachments won't work, as the images are typically logos and icons that won't make sense out of the context of the message. Also, some elements of the email are links into an online system, so generating a static PDF and attaching won't work (to my knowledge anyway).

snippet:

MIME-Version: 1.0
To: me@gmail.com
BCC: me@yahoo.com
From: email@yahoo.com
Subject: Test
Reply-To: email@yahoo.com
Content-Type: multipart/related; boundary="a1b2c3d4e3f2g1"

--a1b2c3d4e3f2g1

content-type: text/html;

    
    My title
    
    
    

... more html here ...

 

--a1b2c3d4e3f2g1

Content-Type: image/gif;
Content-ID:
Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64
Content-Disposition: inline

[base64 image data here]

--a1b2c3d4e3f2g1--

Many thanks.

BTW: Yes, I have verified that the base64 data is correct, as I can embed the image in the html itself (using same algo use for creating header data) and see image in Firefox/IE.

I should also note that this is NOT for spam, the emails are sent to specific clients who are expecting it daily. The content is data-driven, and not adverts.

user_8804427 · Answer

I know this is an old post, but the current answers dont address the fact that outlook and many other email providers dont support inline images or CID images. The most effective way to place images in emails is to host it online and place a link to it in the email. For small email lists a public dropbox works fine. This also keeps the email size down.

user_5853685 · Answer

For those who couldnt get one of these solutions working: Send inline image in email Following the steps laid out in the solution offered by @T30 i was able to get my inline image to display without being blocked by outlook (previous methods it was blocked). If you are using exchange like we are then also when doing:

service = new ExchangeService(ExchangeVersion);
service.AutodiscoverUrl("email@domain.com");
SmtpClient smtp = new SmtpClient(service.Url.Host);

you will need to pass it your exchange service url host. Other than that following this solution should allow you to easily send embedded imgages.

user_990750 · Answer

The following is working code with two ways of achieving this:

using System;
using Outlook = Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook;

namespace ConsoleApp2
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {

            Method1();
            Method2();
        }

        public static void Method1()
        {
            Outlook.Application outlookApp = new Outlook.Application();
            Outlook.MailItem mailItem = outlookApp.CreateItem(Outlook.OlItemType.olMailItem);
            mailItem.Subject = "This is the subject";
            mailItem.To = "john@example.com";
            string imageSrc = "D:\Temp\test.jpg"; // Change path as needed

            var attachments = mailItem.Attachments;
            var attachment = attachments.Add(imageSrc);
            attachment.PropertyAccessor.SetProperty("http://schemas.microsoft.com/mapi/proptag/0x370E001F", "image/jpeg");
            attachment.PropertyAccessor.SetProperty("http://schemas.microsoft.com/mapi/proptag/0x3712001F", "myident"); // Image identifier found in the HTML code right after cid. Can be anything.
            mailItem.PropertyAccessor.SetProperty("http://schemas.microsoft.com/mapi/id/{00062008-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}/8514000B", true);

            // Set body format to HTML

            mailItem.BodyFormat = Outlook.OlBodyFormat.olFormatHTML;
            string msgHTMLBody = "Hello,

This is a working example of embedding an image unsing C#:



Regards,
Tarik Hoshan";
            mailItem.HTMLBody = msgHTMLBody;
            mailItem.Send();
        }

        public static void Method2()
        {

            // Create the Outlook application.
            Outlook.Application outlookApp = new Outlook.Application();

            Outlook.MailItem mailItem = (Outlook.MailItem)outlookApp.CreateItem(Outlook.OlItemType.olMailItem);

            //Add an attachment.
            String attachmentDisplayName = "MyAttachment";

            // Attach the file to be embedded
            string imageSrc = "D:\Temp\test.jpg"; // Change path as needed

            Outlook.Attachment oAttach = mailItem.Attachments.Add(imageSrc, Outlook.OlAttachmentType.olByValue, null, attachmentDisplayName);

            mailItem.Subject = "Sending an embedded image";

            string imageContentid = "someimage.jpg"; // Content ID can be anything. It is referenced in the HTML body

            oAttach.PropertyAccessor.SetProperty("http://schemas.microsoft.com/mapi/proptag/0x3712001E", imageContentid);

            mailItem.HTMLBody = String.Format(
                "Hello,

This is an example of an embedded image:



Regards,
Tarik",
                imageContentid);

            // Add recipient
            Outlook.Recipient recipient = mailItem.Recipients.Add("john@example.com");
            recipient.Resolve();

            // Send.
            mailItem.Send();
        }
    }
}

user_3006199 · Answer

One additional hint to Pavel Perna's post which helped me very much (cannot comment with my reputation, that's why I post this as answer): In some versions of Microsoft Exchange, the inline contents disposition is removed (see this post by Microsoft). The image is simply not part in the mail the user sees in Outlook. As a workaround, use "Content-Disposition: attachement" instead. Outlook 2016 won't show images as attachement that are used in the mail message, although they use the "Content-Disposition: attachement".

user_6272374 · Answer

Try to resolve that with Context.Request:

In my situation, when I used Content-ID I had that image as an attachment as well, and that was not the best solution.

embedding image in html email

13 Answers