How to validate email addresses in PHP

Validate e-mail in PHP, with cURL

<?php

$curl = curl_init();

curl_setopt_array($curl, array(
	CURLOPT_URL => "https://mailcheck.p.rapidapi.com/?domain=EMAIL-OR-DOMAIN",
	CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER => true,
	CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION => true,
	CURLOPT_ENCODING => "",
	CURLOPT_MAXREDIRS => 10,
	CURLOPT_TIMEOUT => 30,
	CURLOPT_HTTP_VERSION => CURL_HTTP_VERSION_1_1,
	CURLOPT_CUSTOMREQUEST => "GET",
	CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER => array(
		"x-rapidapi-host: mailcheck.p.rapidapi.com",
		"x-rapidapi-key: YOUR-API-KEY"
	),
));

$response = curl_exec($curl);
$err = curl_error($curl);

curl_close($curl);

if ($err) {
	echo "cURL Error #:" . $err;
} else {
	echo $response;
}
                

This will return a JSON-array with information about the domain, and if you should block it or not.

Validate e-mail in PHP, with HTTP v2

<?php

$client = new http\Client;
$request = new http\Client\Request;

$request->setRequestUrl('https://mailcheck.p.rapidapi.com/');
$request->setRequestMethod('GET');
$request->setQuery(new http\QueryString(array(
	'disable_test_connection' => 'true',
	'domain' => 'EMAIL-OR-DOMAIN'
)));

$request->setHeaders(array(
	'x-rapidapi-host' => 'mailcheck.p.rapidapi.com',
	'x-rapidapi-key' => 'YOUR-API-KEY'
));

$client->enqueue($request)->send();
$response = $client->getResponse();

echo $response->getBody();
                

Validate e-mail in PHP, with Unirest

$response = Unirest\Request::get("https://mailcheck.p.rapidapi.com/?domain=EMAIL-OR-DOMAIN",
  array(
    "X-RapidAPI-Host" => "mailcheck.p.rapidapi.com",
    "X-RapidAPI-Key" => "YOUR-API-KEY"
  )
);
                

You can of course just send it as a regular GET-request to that URL also, in your favorite way, as long as you have the API-key in the header.

You will receive a JSON response, telling you if this is a disposable e-mail to block, or if there are other issues with the domain:

{
   "valid": true,
   "block": true,
   "disposable": true,
   "domain": "nypato.com",
   "text": "Disposable e-mail",
   "reason": "Heuristics (1b)",
   "risk": 91,
   "mx_host": "mail57.nypato.com",
   "mx_info": "Using MX pointer mail57.nypato.com from DNS with priority: 5",
   "mx_ip": "109.236.80.110",
   "last_changed_at": "2020-06-11T09:56:02+02:00"
}
               

This will tell you if you should block the domain nypato.com or not, and the reason to why the API thinks so (disposable e-mail, etc). You can also see more detailed documentation of the response here.

To get started for free, and get an API key, click here!