Windows 10 reached EOS (end of support) on October 14, 2025. If you are on Windows 10, see this article.

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More
Archived

The folder 'Inbox' cannot be compacted because writing to folder failed. Verify that you have enough disk space, and that you have write privileges to the file system, then try again.

windmillthorns

Receiving this error a couple times a day when using Thunderbird: "The folder 'Inbox' could not be compacted because writing to folder failed. Verify that you have enough disk space, and that you have write privileges to the file system, then try again."

I can delete some emails but for the most part, everything in the Inbox cannot be deleted. I have looked at other forums but I haven't found a concrete set of steps to get this error fixed. I am not very familiar with the inner workings of Thunderbird, so more details on how exactly to get this fixed if possible would be appreciated.

Receiving this error a couple times a day when using Thunderbird: "The folder 'Inbox' could not be compacted because writing to folder failed. Verify that you have enough disk space, and that you have write privileges to the file system, then try again." I can delete some emails but for the most part, everything in the Inbox cannot be deleted. I have looked at other forums but I haven't found a concrete set of steps to get this error fixed. I am not very familiar with the inner workings of Thunderbird, so more details on how exactly to get this fixed if possible would be appreciated.

Modified by Wayne Mery

All Replies (3)

There is currently a bug where users are incorrectly presented with this error. It will hopefully be fixed soon. Until then, don't worry about disk space.

Thank you for the quick answer. Could someone possibly notify me via this thread when the issue is patched? Or is there a site that gives status updates on known issues which I can check?

Modified by windmillthorns

Is the problem gone for you with 142.0 release or 140.2.1 esr, or newer?