To stop the autofilling, click settings>composition and UNtick the box to 'automatically add outgoing email addresses'

That's great to know and I appreciate the quick reply... but I actually like the autofill...my issue is how to get rid of these save contacts that are wrong, incomplete or un-useful. this attachment is what I see when I put my email address in the search. most of them are needing to be deleted because it will autofill the one that is incomplete "lynn@szetosolutions". without the .com or why there is an affiliation of the same email with the DMV or Target, I have no idea why...but it auto populates and it's annoying.

See attached screen shot. I would like my email to only be affiliated with my name..

I notice there is no edit button to delete the contacts

You could just highlight multiple entries and press the delete key.

Hi David

It didn't work. it doesn't give the option to delete anywhere and when I hit delete, it doesn't do anything.

I cannot duplicate that. I highlight an entry and click 'delete' and TB prompts to confirm.

I agree with Lynn Quan "it doesn't give the option to delete anywhere and when I hit delete, it doesn't do anything.".

Have you tried - highlight an email entry - right click - select 'delete' from the drop-down menu

Hi David Thanks for your kind reply. I don't quite understand: by "highlight an email entry" do you mean a message? In that case it doesn't work. I can't right click on a Mac but Ctrl click is the equivalent, I think. This gives me a drop down menu and it does include Delete (ie: Delete the message). But that never was my problem. I can delete messages easily by hitting a single Delete key on my Mac.

But (as I've already said) I want to know how I can delete a contact from my Address book. There if I highlight a contact the drop-down menu does not offer that option, and neither does the card that appears on the right.. It doesn't offer an Edit option either.

There is an exception: the Address book named Collected Addresses. If I click on an address there I see a card on the right and in that card there is an Edit button on the right that opens a window which has a Delete option in red.

Why is Collected Addresses the only Address book that offers that option? Lastly, I have tried a workaround, transferring contacts from the other Address books to the Collected Addresses since I could then Delete them. But If I transfer a C)ontact in that way it doesn't disappear from the other Addresses. It just become copied to Collected Addresses, the original stays where it is.

The problem remains whole, and I've now been wrestling with it for several hours. What is wrong?

This may be a bug specific to your Mac. I suggest posting a bug report at https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/home and list your Thunderbird version an Mac info, plus the description that addressbook entries cannot be deleted.

Thank you for trying to help, but https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/home does not have any answer to the question. I've arrived here https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/products/thunderbird/emails-thunderbird/read-send-and-organize-emails and there's no answer. I also cannot write an entry.

Quite simply, on my iMac running os Sonoma 14.0, and Thunderbird 115.8.0, I find it impossible to delete contacts from my Address books, except my Collected Addresses.

No, highlighting a contact in the Address books and holding down Ctrl (or any other key) does NOT offer the option to Delete. It used to but no longer does.

To be clear: if I highlight a contact it opens a card, and in Collected Addresses this card offers an Edit option (that then allows deletion of the contact). In Collected Addresses, as I said. In any other of the Address books then card doesn't have an Edit option..

There seems to be a bug somewhere, and after 20 years of using Thunderbird it's disappointing.

Have you tried - highlight an email entry - right click - select 'delete' from the drop-down menu

Hi David...if I highlight an email, the only offering is to delete the email...not delete the address...unless I am understanding your suggestion incorrectly.

Thanks for hanging in there with me!

I agree with Lynn Quan "it doesn't give the option to delete anywhere and when I hit delete, it doesn't do anything.".

I'm sorry you are experiencing the same...I sympathize but on the other hand, I'm encouraged that I'm not just "that tech challenged"

grateful to share the journey with you.

Hi David Thanks for your kind reply. I don't quite understand: by "highlight an email entry" do you mean a message? In that case it doesn't work. I can't right click on a Mac but Ctrl click is the equivalent, I think. This gives me a drop down menu and it does include Delete (ie: Delete the message). But that never was my problem. I can delete messages easily by hitting a single Delete key on my Mac. But (as I've already said) I want to know how I can delete a contact from my Address book. There if I highlight a contact the drop-down menu does not offer that option, and neither does the card that appears on the right.. It doesn't offer an Edit option either. There is an exception: the Address book named Collected Addresses. If I click on an address there I see a card on the right and in that card there is an Edit button on the right that opens a window which has a Delete option in red. Why is Collected Addresses the only Address book that offers that option? Lastly, I have tried a workaround, transferring contacts from the other Address books to the Collected Addresses since I could then Delete them. But If I transfer a C)ontact in that way it doesn't disappear from the other Addresses. It just become copied to Collected Addresses, the original stays where it is. The problem remains whole, and I've now been wrestling with it for several hours. What is wrong?

Thanks, I went and tried to delete from different address books, spurred on my your contribution. I am able to delete contacts from my Personal Address book and Collected Addresses I am unable to delete contacts from my Mac OS X Address book

Maybe it's an Apple thing.

David, are you working on an Apple computer? Thanks, Lynn

Thank you for trying to help, but https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/home does not have any answer to the question. I've arrived here https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/products/thunderbird/emails-thunderbird/read-send-and-organize-emails and there's no answer. I also cannot write an entry. Quite simply, on my iMac running os Sonoma 14.0, and Thunderbird 115.8.0, I find it impossible to delete contacts from my Address books, except my Collected Addresses. No, highlighting a contact in the Address books and holding down Ctrl (or any other key) does NOT offer the option to Delete. It used to but no longer does. To be clear: if I highlight a contact it opens a card, and in Collected Addresses this card offers an Edit option (that then allows deletion of the contact). In Collected Addresses, as I said. In any other of the Address books then card doesn't have an Edit option.. There seems to be a bug somewhere, and after 20 years of using Thunderbird it's disappointing.

I'm there with you Xavier...I've been using Thunderbird for decades as well. I feel it's the most efficient browser for my business. Maybe it's because I'm so embedded in the way it's done. And after this many years, my address book is packed with thousands of contacts...and the auto fill is annoying when it's someone that doesn't exist at that company any longer.

Grrrrr!

Xavier Kreiss said

Hi David Thanks, I went and tried to delete from different address books, spurred on my your contribution. I am able to delete contacts from my Personal Address book and Collected Addresses I am unable to delete contacts from my Mac OS X Address book Maybe it's an Apple thing. David, are you working on an Apple computer?

It is not David, but yes it is an apple thing. You only get read access to the apple address book in Thunderbird. To actually manage apple contacts you have to use the apple contact tools.

Just an FYI. As of Sunday the 25th February 4.3% of Thunderbird users are using apple products and 1.09% are using Linux, the rest are using windows on various flavors and ages. https://stats.thunderbird.net/#platlang

As this is a peer support forum, finding someone active in the forum and also using a mac is possible, but very uncommon. I only know of one individual and that was about 2 years ago. I think you can generally assume anyone here is not using a MAC unless they specifically say they are. Personally I have not used a mac for about 30 years, is was this little white/cream box thing with a monochrome monitor that erased all my DOS disks without warning. Perhaps an Apple ii or iigs