Contact Form 7 FAQ
March 29, 2008
- Where is the settings page for Contact Form 7?
- How can I add a contact form into my post content?
- How can I add a field to my contact form?
- Nothing shows up in the email, even after adding a tag to the form! How can I include a new field’s input in the email?
- I get emails containing codes such as [foobar]. What’s this? I want to see the user’s input.
- How can I specify a subject for the email?
- Can I place a contact form outside a post?
- Can I embed a contact form into my template file?
- After submitting the form, I get an error message stating “Failed to send your message”. What is wrong?
- The spinning arrow icon shows up once I submit a form, but then nothing happens.
- My contact form behaves oddly on certain browsers.
- I want to use contact form in my language, not in English. How can I do that?
- CAPTCHA does not work; the image does not show up.
- CAPTCHA’s text input box is working on Internet Explorer, but not with Firefox. I cannot enter the code.
Where is the settings page for Contact Form 7?
Log into WordPress and open Settings > Contact Form 7.
How can I add a contact form into my post content?
Open the settings page for Contact Form 7, and then open the contact form you want to add.
Each contact form has its own tag, such as [contact-form 1 "My contact form"]. To insert the contact form into your post, copy the tag and paste it into the post content.
How can I add a field to my contact form?
To add a field, add a tag to the Form textarea.
Each tag has a strict syntax, supporting several options (see Contact Form 7 Tag Syntax).
Learning the syntax might be difficult, but you can easily make a custom tag by using the tag generator instead. Click Generate Tag and simply select the options you’re interested in.
Nothing shows up in the email, even after adding a tag to the form! How can I include a new field’s input in the email?
You need to add a new tag to the Mail fields. This tag should correspond to the tag in the Form you wish to include in the email. Thus, when you add a new form tag such as [text your-new-field], the corresponding email tag would be [your-new-field]. Only the second part of the tag (”your-new-field”, in this case) is needed for the email.
A tag in the Mail field will be replaced with the user’s input contained in a form field with the same name.
I get emails containing codes such as [foobar]. What’s this? I want to see the user’s input.
See above. In this case, no form tag corresponds to the [foobar] email tag. A tag in the Mail field which has no corresponding tag in the Form will be left without replacement.
How can I specify a subject for the email?
Simply edit the Subject field in the Mail.
Can I place a contact form outside a post?
Yes. You may place a contact form in a text widget as well.
Can I embed a contact form into my template file?
No, this functionality is not yet supported.
After submitting the form, I get an error message stating “Failed to send your message”. What is wrong?
There could be two causes for this. The first is actual mail server trouble, where email cannot be sent. In this case, the error message would be surrounded with a RED border line. Contact your server admin.
The second possible cause is that the form content is classified as spam by Akismet. In this case, the error message would be surrounded with a YELLOW border line.
The spinning arrow icon shows up once I submit a form, but then nothing happens.
This is most probably due to a conflict between plugins. Try deactivating all other plugins.
My contact form behaves oddly on certain browsers.
This may be caused due to invalid HTML, CSS, or Javascript. Please check your form page with a validator or debugging tool.
Useful tools:
Firebug — Firefox extension. Good for Javascript debugging.
XHTML-CSS Validator — A validator with a good UI.
I want to use contact form in my language, not in English. How can I do that?
Contact Form 7 has been translated into many languages. See if the languages folder contains a language file for your language.
The locale setting of Contact Form 7 follows the locale setting of WordPress. Once you change the WordPress locale to, Contact Form 7 is also changed. See how to change the WordPress locale here.
CAPTCHA does not work; the image does not show up.
To use CAPTCHA, you need GD and FreeType library installed on your server. Also, the contact-form-7/captcha/tmp folder must be writable.
CAPTCHA’s text input box is working on Internet Explorer, but not with Firefox. I cannot enter the code.
This is a well-known issue caused by misusing the <label> element. Make sure you are using it correctly.
This is good:
[captchac your-captcha]
<label>Enter the code: [captchar your-captcha]</label>
This will not work correctly:
<label>[captchac your-captcha]
Enter the code: [captchar your-captcha]</label>
April 2, 2008 at 5:01 pm
Hi! Your plugin is very great! Thanks a lot!
I want to ask you if is it possible to view or insert a tag with the IP Address when you receive the contact form by email.
Thank you again!
Best regards
maga
April 3, 2008 at 2:02 am
Love it, thank you!
April 5, 2008 at 9:37 pm
maga,
Now it’s not supported but I have a plan to include it into next Contact Form 7 1.8. Please wait. Thanks.
April 8, 2008 at 12:09 am
Great plugin, good job! I’m now using it on my website :-)
Thanks,
André
April 9, 2008 at 9:47 pm
is there a possibility to include in next versions customized status messages for each form independently, like thanks for sending your message and thanks for suscribing to the newsletter??
April 10, 2008 at 3:45 am
Great form! My only problem is that the “from” address never appears in the emails that are sent.
I’ve copied the same tags into the body of the email, and the “from” name and email address are inserted properly. For some reason, the won’t show up in the “from” field in received emails, however.
Any idea why this is happening?
April 10, 2008 at 12:21 pm
sebastian daru,
I’ll consider it. Thanks.
April 10, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Brad,
The mail protocol specification provides syntax of ‘from’ field, like
You should check your tag used as following this rule.
April 13, 2008 at 11:31 am
Is it possible to class elements for styling purposes, something like: [submit class:custom_button "Submit"] ?
April 14, 2008 at 12:31 am
fienen, class: option for [submit] is not yet implemented. I’ll do it on next version 1.8.x.
April 15, 2008 at 5:42 pm
I love your plugin, the best contact form out there!
But I would like to warn you about a strange behaviour
with the captcha on Firefox: the textbox loose the focus, that way is impossible to fill the captcha code,
except keeping mouse down while typing… (firefox 2.0.0.13)
April 15, 2008 at 8:18 pm
Hi,
Thank you for the plugin! It is great. I love it. Two features that I would love to see are:
1/ option to copy existing form and modify (instead of starting building the form from scratch.
2/ option to create envelope-from (I am not sure this is possible). If it is possible, then envelope-from would allow me to specify domains in which forms are used. Like, when the form is under domain.tld, then envelope-from would say . Great for virtual domains but I am not sure if it can be used at all.
Anyway, thanks for your work! It is definitely appreciated!
Zbigniew Szalbot
April 16, 2008 at 3:47 pm
First, reader sebastian daru says:
April 9, 2008 at 9:47 pm
is there a possibility to include in next versions customized status messages for each form independently, like thanks for sending your message and thanks for suscribing to the newsletter?
Isn’t this already possible by checking Mail 2 and dropping the fields in there? I am developing a site for a non-profit that is using three forms, subscribe (newsletter), join, and donate. On each of those I have mail2 checked and the user gets customized confirmation after he/she hits the submit button for each of these forms.
April 16, 2008 at 3:49 pm
And I love, love, LOVE this form. I could only love it more if two things happened:
1. ability to specify a specific page that the user is returned to after he hits the submit button; and
2. ability to embed form in sidebar without using widget.
Thanks for your hard work on this most excellent plugin!
April 17, 2008 at 4:54 pm
gaddoz,
That is a well-known issue due to misusing
<label>tag. Try to remove them.April 17, 2008 at 5:03 pm
zbyszek,
I’m planning to include 1/ into next Contact Form 7 1.8.x. Import/Export feature.
About 2/ envelope-from, I don’t think it is a thing contact form plugin should manage.
Thank you for the suggestions, anyway.
April 17, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Joni Mueller,
Thank you. They are not implemented, but you’ll be able to do so with Contact Form 7 2.x and a bit customizing. Maybe.
April 20, 2008 at 3:04 am
Hello miyoshi. Great plugin.
I was curious how I would go about adding a custom question field to remove spammers.
I would like to add what is 1 + 1?
If the user doesn’t submit 2 in the form, then it wouldn’t allow the comment to be sent. Is there any way to do this?
April 20, 2008 at 2:37 pm
How do I position the “message successfully sent” banner at the bottom of the form? I have a very long form with multiple send buttons all down the page (so if they click on the send up the top of the form they can’t see the confirmation at the bottom of the form). I would like to position MULTIPLE banners throughout the contact form… maybe at the very top and in the middle? (basically below each send button would be ideal).
OR… can the page be automatically taken down to the bottom of the form after the submission?
Thanks pete
April 20, 2008 at 11:13 pm
Kyle,
At this time this plugin does not support the feature like you wrote. I’m considering to include it into version 1.8 todo list.
April 20, 2008 at 11:17 pm
Peter,
I think that is a good idea. I’ll make it possible in Contact Form 7 1.8. Thank you.
April 22, 2008 at 2:07 am
Hi there,
the catcha doesn’t work on my site:
http://www.coolkidsstuff.co.uk
any idea why.
thanks for your help,
Ezio.
April 24, 2008 at 8:37 pm
Ezio Tuveri, you seems not to add
[captchac captcha-802]. See How to use CAPTCHA.May 1, 2008 at 10:00 pm
Using WordPress 2.5.1, contact form 7 1.7.7.
Captcha is working allright on MS Internet Explorer 7, but not with Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.14.
When trying to enter the captcha code, the cursor disappears right away. If you click into the captcha input field and hold down the mouse button, it’s possible to enter the code.
So it is some sort of a programming problem?!
Kind regards
Martin Fischer
May 3, 2008 at 9:40 pm
Martin Fischer, it’s not a problem of the plugin. It is a well known phenomenon caused by misusing of
<label>element. Check your form and remove<label>around the captcha tags if possible.May 6, 2008 at 8:25 pm
Hi,
bit of a rookie here! i’m trying to install the contact box but the spinning arrow doesn’t disappear!
I know the FAQ tells you to de-activate all the other plugin’s, but will this mean they will stop working on your site?
May 6, 2008 at 9:08 pm
louise, yes, but it is just for an investigation. Once you find the plugin of the cause or find nothing has problem, you can activate them.
May 7, 2008 at 7:16 pm
Contact form installed and working ok.
But another form on the website is now spaced incorrectly.
http://www.cpthorntonguitars.com/purchase/logo-gear/
Shows too much space between paypal buttons. When the Contact Form 7 plugin is deactivated, spacing becomes correct again!
I cannot find anything in the css to change to fix this.
Thanks for any help.
May 8, 2008 at 11:52 pm
Somi, unfortunately, this is not an issue directly related to the plugin. I can’t help you but I recommend you use XHTML-CSS Validator.