Insert a line break in mailto body

201
votes

I would like to insert a line break into my mailto body. I tried %0A, %0D and %0D%0A. Nothing worked for me. I tested on Gmail, Yahoo, Apple Mail, Outlook 2010, Outlook.com and Thunderbird with Google Chrome on Mac OSX.

Any help please ?

Here's my code :

<a href="mailto:[email protected]?subject=Subscribe&body=Lastame%20%3A%0D%0A%20Firstname%20%3A"><img alt="Subscribe" class="center" height="50" src="subscribe.png" style="width: 137px; height: 50px; color: #4da6f7; font-size: 20px; display: block;" width="137"></a>
6
emailmailto
possible duplicate: stackoverflow.com/questions/15019689/… – John
@John How is that a duplicate? That is a very specific question about %20 being used to enter new line, not how to make a new line like this question. – jdmdevdotnet
Looks like a dupe to me. That question asks "how do i insert a line break like i do a space". It isn't asking how to use %20 as a newline. The only substantial difference I see is this is asking about the body, whereas that question asks about the subject. Its the same answer in either case, though. – user47589
Does this answer your question? mailto link multiple body lines – jtbandes

6 Answers

292
votes

I would suggest you try the html tag <br>, in case your marketing application will recognize it.

I use %0D%0A. This should work as long as the email is HTML formatted.

<a href="mailto:[email protected]?subject=Subscribe&body=Lastame%20%3A%0D%0AFirstname%20%3A"><img alt="Subscribe" class="center" height="50" src="subscribe.png" style="width: 137px; height: 50px; color: #4da6f7; font-size: 20px; display: block;" width="137"></a>

You will likely want to take out the %20 before Firstname, otherwise you will have a space as the first character on the next line.

A note, when I tested this with your code, it worked (along with some extra spacing). Are you using a mail client that doesn't allow HTML formatting?

142
votes

As per RFC2368 which defines mailto:, further reinforced by an example in RFC1738, it is explicitly stated that the only valid way to generate a line break is with %0D%0A.

This also applies to all url schemes such as gopher, smtp, sdp, imap, ldap, etc..

5
votes

Curiously in gmail for android %0D%0A doesn't work and <br> works:

<a href="mailto:[email protected]?subject=This%20is%20Subject&body=First line<br>Second line">
   click here to mail me
</a>
4
votes

For plaintext email using JavaScript, you may also use \r with encodeURIComponent().

For example, this message: 

hello\rthis answer is now well formated\rand it contains good knowleadge\rthat is why I am up voting

URI Encoded, results in:

hello%0Dthis%20answer%20is%20now%20well%20formated%0Dand%20it%20contains%20good%20knowleadge%0Dthat%20is%20why%20I%20am%20up%20voting

And, using the href:

mailto:[email protected]?body=hello%0Dthis%20answer%20is%20now%20well%20formated%0Dand%20it%20contains%20good%20knowleadge%0Dthat%20is%20why%20I%20am%20up%20voting

Will result in the following email body text:

hello
this answer is now well formated
and it contains good knowleadge
that is why I am up voting
2
votes
<a href="mailto:[email protected]?subject=Request&body=Hi,%0DName:[your name] %0DGood day " target="_blank"></a>

Try adding %0D to break the line. This will definitely work.

Above code will display the following:

Hi,
Name:[your name] 
Good day
0
votes

For the Single line and double line break here are the following codes.

Single break: %0D0A
Double break: %0D0A%0D0A