PHPMailer save emails to IMAP folder

example.php

<?php

include("Mailer.php");

$mail = new Mailer();
$mail->isSMTP(); // Tell PHPMailer we're going to use SMTP
$mail->Host = 'mail.localhost'; // Set SMTP host
$mail->Username = 'noreply@localhost'; // Set the our email address
$mail->Password = 'YourPassword'; // Set email address password
$mail->From = "john.doe@example.com"; // The sender's email
$mail->FromName = "John Doe"; // The sender's name
$mail->addAddress("recipient@localhost"); // Recipient's email
$mail->addReplyTo($mail->From, $mail->FromName); // Add a reply to
$mail->Subject = "Mail for you!"; // Message subject
$mail->Body    = "Your message contents..."; // Message contents
if($mail->send()) { // Attempt to send the email
    $mail->copyToFolder(); // Will save into inbox
    $mail->copyToFolder("Sent"); // Will save into Sent folder
} else {
    echo "An error occurred, failed to send the email";
}

Mailer.php

<?php

class Mailer extends PHPMailer {

    /**
     * Save email to a folder (via IMAP)
     *
     * This function will open an IMAP stream using the email
     * credentials previously specified, and will save the email
     * to a specified folder. Parameter is the folder name (ie, Sent)
     * if nothing was specified it will be saved in the inbox.
     *
     * @author David Tkachuk <http://davidrockin.com/>
     */
    public function copyToFolder($folderPath = null) {
        $message = $this->MIMEHeader . $this->MIMEBody;
        $path = "INBOX" . (isset($folderPath) && !is_null($folderPath) ? ".".$folderPath : ""); // Location to save the email
        $imapStream = imap_open("{" . $this->Host . "}" . $path , $this->Username, $this->Password);

        imap_append($imapStream, "{" . $this->Host . "}" . $path, $message);
        imap_close($imapStream);
    }

}

Thank you for your input! I did something similar without extending the PHPMailer class.

$imapStream = imap_open("{localhost:143/novalidate-cert}Sent", $username, $password);
imap_append($imapStream, "{localhost:143}Sent", $mail->getSentMIMEMessage(), "\\Seen");
imap_close($imapStream);

I know that this is a bit "old" but I had some trouble with this

<b>Notice</b>: Unknown: rsh to IMAP server timed out (errflg=1) in <b>Unknown</b> on line <b>0</b>

And i fixed it like this :

public function copyToFolder($folderPath = null) {
$message = $this->MIMEHeader . $this->MIMEBody;
$path = "INBOX" . (isset($folderPath) && !is_null($folderPath) ? ".".$folderPath : ""); // Location to save the email
$imapStream = imap_open("{" . $this->Host . "/tls/novalidate-cert/norsh/service=imap/user=" . $this->Username . "}" . $path , $this->Username, $this->Password);
imap_append($imapStream, "{" . $this->Host . "}" . $path, $message);
imap_close($imapStream);
}

I had to add /tls/novalidate-cert/norsh/service=imap/user=" . $this->Username . "

Hope this will help someone :)

By the way, thanks for the function !

Thank you very much for this handy code!

A few remarks on what I had to change in order to get it working:

1. class Mailer extends \PHPMailer\PHPmailer\PHPMailer {}
2. $message = $this->getSentMIMEMessage();
3. Don't forget to add the IMAP port and needed flags for your server, so $imapStream = imap_open("{[host]:[port]/[flags]}" . $path , $this->Username, $this->Password);, otherwise you'll not be able to connect to your server.
4. On my e-mail server, the "sent" inbox was not "INBOX.Sent" but just "Sent". You can check the name of your inboxes using the imap_list() function. So I used $path = (isset($folderPath) && !is_null($folderPath) ? $folderPath : "");
5. If you want to mark the e-mails you put in the inbox as read, you can do this: imap_append($imapStream, "{" . $this->Host . "}" . $path, $message ."\r\n","\\Seen");

Good day and have fun coding! ;)

With PHPMailer v5.2.27 mails go to a "Sent" folder without a subject. But recipient receives email to INBOX with subject.