Thunderbird Community Forum

I'm getting a popup error message saying "Unable to write the email to the mailbox" on one of my gmail accounts. This has happened a few times before and I'm not sure how I managed to get it working again those times, seems hit-or-miss. I've compacted and run a repair on the inbox folder several times as suggested by others. I've updated and restarted Thunderbird and even updated windows and restarted more than once.

Windows 11 Pro Thunderbird 158.0 (64 bit)

I'm attaching a screenshot from the Error Console (Tools -> Developer Tools -> Error Console)

I was using Thunderbird 153.4.0esr 64-bit and my send feature on GMail stopped working. It just spun and spun with no connection.

So, I removed the GMail account from my accounts list and then tried re-adding it, but only received the following error (see image attached). This implies what? I have an account at GMail already? I have a remnant of the previous working account in my configuration? It was working fine until today.

I'm using the automatically derived ports (993 inbound and 465 outbound). That error message appears immediately after having clicked the "Continue" button.

System:

 Kernel: 6.8.0-147-generic arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 13.3.0 clocksource: tsc
 Desktop: Xfce v: 4.18.1 tk: Gtk v: 3.24.41 wm: xfwm4 v: 4.18.0 with: xfce4-panel
   tools: light-locker vt: 7 dm: LightDM v: 1.30.0 Distro: Linux Mint 22.2 Zara
   base: Ubuntu 24.04 noble

I no longer have a right click menu available for photos in an email. There is only the option to zoom in or back out. My screen does not match what directions Google has to offer to fix the bug.

I am a bit of a noob, and probably out of my depth, so please bear with me. It also is a bit of a confusing situation so I hope that I can explain it clearly.

A while ago, Thunderbird stopped working. Whenever I tried starting it up, I got an error message saying that Thunderbird wasn't responding. I thought there might be a problem with some update so I decided that I would reinstall the program. As I went to back up my profile, I found out that there were actually two profile folders where in the past I would only find one. I chose to back up both, and procede with de- and re-installing Thunderbird. After doing so I tried to integrate the old profiles back into the new installation. At first, I chose the largest of the to profile maps and copied it where I found it before the re-installation. I created a new profile using the old profile folder through the User Profile menu. This seemed to work! However, I noticed something. I have two e-mail accounts running in this profile. One IMAP and one POP. I noticed that the POP account was missing about a years worth of old e-mails. As if it stopped saving them at some point. I figured they must be in the other profile folder I found before the re-installation. I tried creating a new profile with this profile but when starting up Thunderbird afterwards I once again got the 'Thunderbird isn't responding' message. So I reverted back to the first profile I made, the one with the missing e-mails. Appart from those e-mails, it seemed to be working well. To get back what was missing, I tried copying the files in the "inbox.sbd" of the back up that wasn't responding into the back up that was responding, thinking that if it messed something up, I could just CTRL + Z my way out of trouble. It seemed that there were three locations in the functioning back up that I could copy the files into, each having the server name of the e-mail account that I was missing e-mails from. I tried copying the files in each of them, each time removing the files through 'undo' before trying the next location. As this seemed unsuccesfull I tried restarting Thunderbird again (having removed the copied files from all locations) which resulted in the following error message:

In a pink screen that I have never seen before. After this I tried removing all profiles and starting again with a fresh copy of the backed up profile folder as I figured I might have accidentally changed something in the profile folder I was using. This however keeps giving the same error message.

Clearly, I messed something up. But I don't know what. Can anybody help? One last thing I noticed that in the 'Mail' folder within the profile folder, there where three folders with the server name before, now there is only one. I guess this is a clue?

All help is welcome!

For some strange reason, I have one message in my inbox that does not display in the window below it (just a blank window) and the message subject line can not be deleted at all. Message title has been there for a week now, shows up every time I start Thunderbird but it can not be displayed or deleted. I have received, read and deleted dozens of message since, it just remains as if haunting the app in defiance of any common sense at all. How do I delete it?

The image shows the message selected and the blank window below, once I select another message and then go back to this rouge message, the previous messages window remains, the blank window does not come back up, Indicated to me that there is nothing in this rouge window to be displayed, hence it is blank if the first message selected.

Hi, since beginning of October 2026 I cannot access my multiple AOL-accounts in Thunderbird under Windows 11. I am prompted to the AOL page, insert PW but at the end: "an error occurred". The PW is valid; I can log in to the aol-accounts on the AOL-homepage.

I already set all methods to OAuth2 and set usePrivatBrowser to true as mentioned in the forum; but it does not work. Any ideas?

I have Thunderbird on laptop. I make changes to a contact in the address book and they seem to be made. When I close Thunderbird and restart it, all changes are lost and are back to what the contact information was before. This has to be fixed.

bonjour, depuis quelques jours il m'est impossible d'attacher une pièce jointe à mes envois de message avec THUNDERBIRD... bouton "joindre" inopérant.. bug constaté sur mes deux ordinateurs (bureau et portable) équipés de: - Windows 11 - Thunderbird 157.0.1 Merci Cordialement Jean

I'm using Thunderbird on Ubuntu 24 and have some messages in some mailboxes that have lost their headers. I'm trying to fix them.

Early (1980's command line mail & mailx) mbox files were pure text with messages delimited by a blank line followed by a line starting with 'From ' (or possibly 'From: '). When I open a Thunderbird mbox file in 'vi' it is 'converted', or so it says. I'm wondering what this 'conversion' is and why it's needed.

Please could someone tell me what the strict rule that delimits messages in a Thunderbird mbox file is, and what is it that 'vi' cannot handle that requires 'conversion'?

Thanks

153.3.1esr (64-bit) Thunderbird Meadow Thunderbird Snap for Ubuntuubuntu-snap-build - 1.0

Hi Despite I make reminders (I get the bell symbol for the event) for events in calendar, I don't receive alarms any more. If I have Thunderbird open at the time for the alarm, I might get an alarm. If I then postpone the event I don't receive the new alarm. I have had Thunderbird and calendar for several years and it has worked without any problems, I would receive alarms occured for the time I didn't have Thunderbird open, when I opened Thunderbird. I did get the alarms, also when I postponed an event. But for long it hasn't worked. I can't rely on the calendar not receiving alarms/reminders. I have tried to delete/remove Thunderbird and install again, that didn't help. I hope someone can help me, please. Answers in Danish are welcome. Best Joyanna

Hello,

I urgently need technical assistance with a serious issue involving Mozilla Thunderbird and my professional certified email account (Aruba PEC, Italy).

I have been using Thunderbird to manage my professional email correspondence for several years.

I organize processed emails into yearly folders (2024, 2025, 2026, etc.), located under my email account in Thunderbird, not under Local Folders.

Today, October 13, 2026, I discovered that all emails dated January through September 2026 have disappeared from my "2026" folder.

Only emails from October 2026 remain.

The missing messages include professional correspondence, certified email delivery receipts, acceptance receipts, and potentially legally significant communications.

What I have verified so far:

The "2026" folder exists both in Thunderbird and in Aruba Webmail.

Both display the same remaining emails from October.

The Trash folder is empty.

The 2024 and 2025 folders still contain their messages.

Thunderbird's retention settings are configured to "Don't delete any messages."

The "2026" folder inherits the account's retention settings.

I did not knowingly delete or move these messages.

Aruba customer support informed me that they cannot restore the missing emails.

I checked Windows Previous Versions and OneDrive, but no backup was found.

I located the local Thunderbird mailbox file named "2026" in the profile's ImapMail directory. It is approximately 3 MB.

Inspection of a copy of this file did not reveal message headers from before October 2026.

I could not find another larger copy of this mailbox file in the Thunderbird profile.

I occasionally remove unused folders under "Local Folders", but I do not recall deleting any folder containing these messages. The affected "2026" folder is located under the IMAP email account.

My questions are:

Could Thunderbird have deleted or moved these messages automatically despite the retention settings?

Could IMAP synchronization, folder corruption, message filters, or compaction explain this situation?

Are there any additional Thunderbird files, caches, databases, or recovery methods worth investigating?

Is there any way to identify when or how the messages were deleted?

What steps should I take to prevent further data loss?

I have preserved a backup copy of my Thunderbird profile and would prefer not to perform potentially destructive operations.

This is particularly serious because the missing messages are part of my professional and legally relevant correspondence.

Any technical guidance would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you very much for your help.

Hi I have four IMAP email accounts configured in Thunderbird. Three get email from my servers the fourth from Google mail.

I am finding that one of the accounts emails are also ending up in Google mail, the other two are functioning normally.

I have checked for email forwarding etc and cannot find anything.

I removed the account, leaving the Gmail account alone, from my mobile and the phenomenon stops till I fire up the PC.

Anyone got any ideas?

Jules

Hi, my mozilla has just stopped dowloading messages to my laptop. Oddly, any messages sent seem to be received, and a test to my phone to myself verifies. Any suggestions please I would be most grateful for!

I have 5 Gmail accounts they r all configured the same I automatically let thunderbird install two but none of the other three will not connect i have tried everything i can think of but to no avail

dear support, plese help me, i accidentally remove message data when i want to move email to another laptop. usually if mesage data in local D, the checkbox will greyed but it grey and checked what should i do. i already use recovery software but inbox & sent file won't recover, only archive like 2025 & 2025.msf and it can't be oppened, message still empty although capacity of that file 3GB. any help will really appreciate.

При отправке сообщений перестала работать функция сохранения копий в папку ;Отправленные", в уведомлениях появляется сообщение: Предупреждение от учётной записи «ur@aliotplyus.ru»: append Failed to store message. Please, try again later. sc=iXL0I30LkCg0_2026-10-13-05-35_

I like using Threads, to keep repeated exchanges together.

Today, I selected one of my emails, then Edit as New, to edit and send some of the content to a couple others, independent of the thread.

but now, those emails to others are linked to the initial thread with the original recipient. I do not want them to be linked to that conversation thread, but instead for them to be in their own thread if a continuing email exchange occurs with these.

I do not want to remove them from history, but rather to merely break the existing link to the thread involving a totally unrelated recipient.