Thunderbird Community Forum

Until recently the folder pane could be sized or hidden via the double-headed arrowed cursor. Shortly after the 151.0.1 update this stopped working. All suggested solutions have not worked. A full uninstall (Revo Uninstall) and completely new profile has not fixed the problem. Folder pane only responds to the menu setting and is only Open/close but no sizing.

As the topic says, the message list turned from the usual dark-mode look, to a full black background after updating to 151.0.

Was this an intentional change? How can I revert it?

I had tbird set up just how I liked it on my laptop. Then the laptop screen hinge broke and I had to replace it. Have installed tbird on new machine but cannot find the setting I need. I want the message preview pane to be on the bottom instead of on the right side of screen. I also need to know how to import my contacts from the old machine.

I want to collapse all folders in my email account.

I have a lot of them, and I don't want to close/expand them all individually. I want to quickly close all or expand all

Is there a button to do that ?

Subject: Persistent Column and Folder Layout Issues — Not Being Saved Between Sessions

This is a follow-up to my previous support requests regarding two ongoing problems that significantly impact daily usability.

Column Settings I manage multiple accounts, and my preferred column layout is: Starred, Read Status, Attachment, Subject, From, and Date/Time. I do not use Threads, Correspondents, or Spam Status columns. Despite setting these preferences repeatedly, Thunderbird fails to retain them. Every day I must spend time reconfiguring columns across some or all of my accounts — the state varies unpredictably from one session to the next. This is a persistent, daily frustration that costs meaningful time. Most other major email clients save and reliably maintain column preferences. I'd expect Thunderbird to do the same.

Folder Panel Layout Two problems occur regularly when Thunderbird loads:

Folder order — Standard system folders (Inbox, Sent, Drafts, All Mail, Trash, Spam) should appear at the top of each account. Instead, Sent, All Mail, Trash, and/or Spam are frequently scattered among custom folders, with no apparent consistency.

Folder expansion — Most or all folders load in an expanded state, exposing every nested sub-folder regardless of whether they contain unread mail. This creates unnecessary visual clutter and requires manual collapsing each session.

Again, this behavior is uncommon in other widely-used email clients. Summary These are not one-time glitches — they recur daily and represent a significant usability gap. I'd appreciate confirmation that these are known issues being tracked, or guidance on a reliable fix. Reformatting the interface every morning is not a reasonable expectation for users.

Hallo, ich habe vorgestern ein neues Win11 aufgesetzt und dann die neueste Version von Thunderbird installiert. Mir ist jetzt aufgefallen das sich die E-Mails nur mit einem Doppelklick öffnen lassen und das dafür ein neues Fenster aufgeht. Früher waren die Mails mit einem Klick zu öffnen und der Inhalt wurde auch direkt unter der Mail angezeigt . In den Einstellung steht der Doppelklick nicht in der Auswahl sondern als einzige Möglichkeit. Gibt es da irgendeine Möglichkeit um das anders einzustellen, einfacher Klick und direktes anzeigen ohne extra Fenster? MfG

Hello, the day before yesterday I set up a new Win11 and then installed the latest version of Thunderbird. I have now noticed that emails can only be opened with a double click and that this opens a new window. Previously, emails could be opened with a single click and the content was also displayed directly below the email. In the settings, double click is not in the selection but is the only option. Is there any way to set it differently, single click and direct display without an extra window? Best regards

I use Thunderbird on dark mode, so by default, unformatted text (where I haven't explicitly set text color) appears as white text on a black background in my compose window. The same unformatted text, when sent to someone viewing it in light mode, appears as black on white to them and remains readable. When I use white text in my compose window, it looks identical to me, but remains white when sent and is thus unreadable white-on-white to those using light mode. Is there something in the composition window that indicates whether I'm typing with formatted or unformatted text? (No, the color selector tool does not do this. When typing unformatted text, it displays the last selected colors, regardless of whether they are being used.)

If there's no way to distinguish this, could someone please add a UI element for it?

Thunderbird aggregates in the same threads e-mails from my employer that are completely unrelated. They are sent in different months, with a different subject, etc. and they end up in the same thread. Clearly, there is something in the header pushing Thunderbird to aggregate them, but this results in a very annoying ordering of the emails.

In my case, e-mail messages are sorted on date with descending order. However, the first message I see in my list dates back to months ago because another message sent few days ago has been merged with the previous one in a thread.

This would not be a problem if the message displayed in the list were the last one added to the thread and not the first one starting the thread.

I have done several searches and read several help pages and discussions here, but I cannot find a way to display threads in the same way the rest of the messages is shown, i.e. latest first. For some obscure reasons, Thunderbird keeps displaying in the message list and in the threaded view (when I expand the thread), the messages in reverse order wrt my selection.

How can I fix this?

Hello,

I have this problem. On only 1 PC from 5, with same mailboxes installed and same configurations, on one of the mailboxes, Thunderbird does not accept setting to "not read" the letter. I tried making time to read the letter and it worked for 10 min, and then again stopped. At final, no matter how it is set, when I push to read the message it always read it.

Tried repairing the folder, but doesn't work.

Any Ideas will be great.

Thank you

I am using Kubuntu 26.04 and I am using the monthly stable channel version of the Thunderbird Snap. In KDE system settings, the default email client is set to Thunderbird. Upon every startup of Thunderbird, it ask if I want to set it as the default client for email, newsgroups, feeds and calendar and when I click yes and close Thunderbird and reopen it it does the same thing, over and over. Otherwise the email program operates just fine otherwise. My email accounts are all setup properly and functioning and working and it downloads email just fine. It just has that annoying popup upon every startup. I've included two images to show what I mean. I like the Snap version and prefer that container format. I would like someone who is smarter than me to file a bug on my behalf.

How can I ensure that messages are always saved locally, along with images?

The IMAP protocol works fine now! How can I ensure that images in emails are always saved locally when the internet is disconnected?

How can I avoid constant requests to image hosts when I reopen an email?

Hi,

I've just updated my Thunderbird for Windows to 151 and I got this nasty surprise (this is why I hate updates these days).

The message list in dark mode, in a table view, now has this awful pitch black background instead of the normal dark brown as it used to have. It looks OK in cards mode, but I don't like cards mode.

I certainly hope this is a bug and not by design. Can this be fixed, please? It looks terrible, it's hard to look at, like old Windows 10 dark mode or some high contrast accessibility mode.

Thank you!

I am using Windows 11 with the latest Thunderbird 151.0.1. I have been trying to add color to the column title background in the message list using the userChrome.css with the following:

1. sizeCol {background-color: #dcfffc !important;}
2. recipientCol {background-color: #dcfffc !important;}
3. subjectCol {background-color: #dcfffc !important;}
4. dateCol {background-color: #dcfffc !important;}

1. spamCol {background-color: #dcfffc !important;}
2. fromCol { background-color: #dcfffc  !important;}
3. attachmentsCol { background-color: #dcfffc  !important;}

They work except the 'from', 'attachments' and 'spam' columns title backgrounds. Can anyone see what I am doing wrong? Or is there a way to color all column title backgrounds in one line? Thanks

My Thunderbird has suddenly stopped showing date and size against incoming emails - it also wasn't showing sender but suddenly changed despite me not changing any options. Date and size are clearly ticked in the drop down box. Basically, it is randomly deciding what to display even when I am not changing options!

My Thunderbird Inbox details included Date and Time for each incoming email but I have somehow stopped that - how do I reset it to display this information? Attached is a screen shot of the top of the display.

[I was sure I submitted this but I can't find it. Sorry if it's a dupe.} Thunderbird v. 151.0 (64-bit) Windows 10

When I reply to or forward a message, I get raw code like:

> ad that says: Mary gets us <https://click.ngpvan.com/

> k/132163625/623609951/778722144?refcode=LOC_EM_FR_2026.05.27_peltola-

> split_B1_F1_S1_C1_60DO90DC120DD_N-

> T0&nvep=ew0KICAiVGVuYW50VXJpIjogIm5ncHZhbjovL3Zhbi9OR1AvTkdQMTkvMS83MjcyMiIsDQogICJEaXN0cmlidXRpb25VbmlxdWVJZCI6ICJlYTIyODEwZS1kYzU5LWYxMTEtOGZjYi0wMDBkM2ExODkwNWMiLA0KICAiRW1haWxBZGRyZXNzIjogImhvb2V5Z29vQGdtYWlsLmNvbSINCn0%3D&hmac=FH6VuhfY9AcHmAdMj2RHECp0IpRhxQHb41JBnp34fM0=>

>

How can I get just the normal readable text quoted (Gmail-style)?

TIA

Hi-

Thunderbird 151.0 (64-bit)

I don't want all the raw code included in my reply/forward, just the readable text in a format similar to the original. GMail handles this with no issues, so how can I get the same in Thunderbird? Thanks.