which is best mail function or mail class in php code example

Example 1: php mail

<?php
$to = $_POST['email'];
$subject = "Email Subject";

$message = 'Dear '.$_POST['name'].',<br>';
$message .= "We welcome you to be part of family<br><br>";
$message .= "Regards,<br>";

// Always set content-type when sending HTML email
$headers = "MIME-Version: 1.0" . "\r\n";
$headers .= "Content-type:text/html;charset=UTF-8" . "\r\n";

// More headers
$headers .= 'From: <[email protected]>' . "\r\n";
$headers .= 'Cc: [email protected]' . "\r\n";

mail($to,$subject,$message,$headers);
?>

Example 2: smtp in php mail function

<?php

error_reporting(E_ALL ^ E_NOTICE ^ E_DEPRECATED ^ E_STRICT);

require_once "Mail.php";

$host = "ssl://smtp.dreamhost.com";
$username = "[email protected]";
$password = "your email password";
$port = "465";
$to = "[email protected]";
$email_from = "[email protected]";
$email_subject = "Subject Line Here:" ;
$email_body = "whatever you like" ;
$email_address = "[email protected]";

$headers = array ('From' => $email_from, 'To' => $to, 'Subject' => $email_subject, 'Reply-To' => $email_address);
$smtp = Mail::factory('smtp', array ('host' => $host, 'port' => $port, 'auth' => true, 'username' => $username, 'password' => $password));
$mail = $smtp->send($to, $headers, $email_body);

if (PEAR::isError($mail)) {
echo("<p>" . $mail->getMessage() . "</p>");
} else {
echo("<p>Message successfully sent!</p>");
}
?>