Email Validation API
Improve your delivery rate and clean your email lists with Abstract’s industry-leading email validation API.
Getting Started
Abstract’s Email Validation and Verification API requires only your unique API key api_key and a single email email:
https://emailvalidation.abstractapi.com/v1/
? api_key = YOUR_UNIQUE_API_KEY
& email = johnsmith@gmail.com
This was a successful request, and all available details about that email were returned:
Request parameters
Your unique API key. Note that each user has unique API keys for each of Abstract’s APIs, so your Email Validation API key will not work for your IP Geolocation API, for example.
The email address to validate.
You can chose to disable auto correct. To do so, just input false for the auto_correct param. By default, auto_correct is turned on.
Response parameters
The API response is returned in a universal and lightweight JSON format.
The value for “email” that was entered into the request.
If a typo has been detected then this parameter returns a suggestion of the correct email (e.g., johnsmith@gmial.com => johnsmith@gmail.com). If no typo is detected then this is empty.
Abstract’s evaluation of the deliverability of the email. Possible values are:
DELIVERABLE, UNDELIVERABLE, and UNKNOWN.
An internal decimal score between 0.01 and 0.99 reflecting Abstract’s confidence in the quality and deliverability of the submitted email.
Is true if the email follows the format of “address @ domain . TLD”. If any
of those elements are missing or if they contain extra or incorrect special
characters, then it returns false.
Is true if the email’s domain is found among Abstract’s list of free email
providers Gmail, Yahoo, etc).
Is true if the email’s domain is found among Abstract’s list of disposable
email providers (e.g., Mailinator, Yopmail, etc).
Is true if the email’s local part (e.g., the “to” part) appears to be for a
role rather than individual. Examples of this include “team@”, “sales@”,
info@”, etc.
Is true if the domain is configured to catch all
email.
Is true if MX Records for the
domain can be found. Only available on paid plans. Will return null and
UNKNOWN on free plans.
Is true if the SMTP
check of the
email was successful. If the check fails, but other checks are valid, we’ll
return the email as UNKNOWN. We recommend not blocking signups or form
submissions when an SMTP check fails.
Request examples
Checking a misspelled email
In the example below, we show the request and response when the API detects a possible misspelling in the requested email.
Note that even if a possible misspelling is detected, all of the other checks on that email (e.g., free email, disposable domain, etc) will still be done against the original submitted email, not against the autocorrected email.
https://emailvalidation.abstractapi.com/v1/
? api_key = YOUR_UNIQUE_API_KEY
& email = johnsmith@gmial.con
The request was valid and successful, and so it returns the following:
{
"email": "johnsmith@glmai.com",
"autocorrect": "johnsmith@gmail.com",
"deliverability": "UNDELIVERABLE",
"quality_score": 0.0,
"is_valid_format": {
"value": true,
"text": "TRUE"
},
"is_free_email": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_disposable_email": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_role_email": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_catchall_email": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_mx_found": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_smtp_valid": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
}
}
Checking a malformed email
In the example below, we show the request and response for an email does not follow the proper format. If the email fails the is_valid_format check, then the other checks (e.g., is_free_email, is_role_email) will not be performed and will be returned as false
https://emailvalidation.abstractapi.com/v1/
? api_key = YOUR_UNIQUE_API_KEY
& email = johnsmith
The request was valid and successful, and so it returns the following:
{
"email": "johnsmith",
"autocorrect": "",
"deliverability": "UNDELIVERABLE",
"quality_score": 0.0,
"is_valid_format": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_free_email": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_disposable_email": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_role_email": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_catchall_email": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_mx_found": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
},
"is_smtp_valid": {
"value": false,
"text": "FALSE"
}
}
Response and error codes
Whenever you make a request that fails for some reason, an error is returned also in the JSON format. The errors include an error code and description, which you can find in detail below.
| Code | Type | Details |
|---|---|---|
| 200 | OK | Everything worked as expected. |
| 400 | Bad request | Bad request. |
| 401 | Unauthorized | The request was unacceptable. Typically due to the API key missing or incorrect. |
| 422 | Quota reached | The request was aborted due to insufficient API credits. (Free plans) |
| 429 | Too many requests | The request was aborted due to the number of allowed requests per second being reached. This happens on free plans as requests are limited to 1 per second. |
| 500 | Internal server error | The request could not be completed due to an error on the server side. |
| 503 | Service unavailable | The server was unavailable. |
Code samples and libraries
Please see the top of this page for code samples for these languages and more. If we’re missing a code sample, or if you’d like to contribute a code sample or library in exchange for free credits, email us at: team@abstractapi.com
Other notes
A note on metered billing: Each individual email you submit counts as a credit used. Credits are also counted per request, not per successful response. So if you submit a request for the (invalid) email address “kasj8929hs”, that still counts as 1 credit.