Google webMail Filer For Thunderbird

Martin Brinkmann
Jan 7, 2011
Updated • Aug 12, 2018
Email, Gmail, Thunderbird
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11

Lets say you have used the Mozilla Thunderbird client for some time and have decided to move to the cloud, more precisely to Gmail or Google Mail.

Question is, how do you get your emails and the folder structure over to Gmail? Sure you could do that manually; create the folders over on the Gmail website and forward each and every of your emails to your Google email address. But that's not very practicable if the mail count exceeds a few dozen. What if you have thousands of emails neatly sorted in folders?

Update: the Thunderbird extension is no longer available. We suggest you use the excellent (and free for personal use) MailStore Home software to back up emails and migrate them to your Gmail account. You may also be able to import emails directly on the Gmail website as you can specify Pop3 or IMAP mailboxes that you want to import there as well. End

Google webMail Filer for Thunderbird

google webmail filer

You need a third party software like Google webMail Filer for Thunderbird then. The free open source application can process Thunderbird mbox (mailbox) files and import them into Gmail.

Users need to supply their Gmail username and password so that the application can import the mails into the account. That's a problem for some even though the program is open source and theoretically at least possible to find out if something shady is going on (it is not). Still, since most computer users don't have time to analyze source code or the ability to read it in first place, some may skip the software because of the requirement. It would have been better if the program would use Google's official authentication options instead.

I'd still recommend to change the password as soon as the operation has completed successfully. The mail export itself is very simple. It begins by entering the Gmail username and password into the required fields before loading a Thunderbird mail folder using the built-in file browser.

The program scans the selected folder and displays all mbox files in a listing. Each can be selected individually or all by selecting the Tootle Selection option. A click on start filing starts the export of the mails to Gmail. The program monitors the size of the Gmail inbox to block uploading once an 85% fill rate is reached.

Note that you get mailbox folders returned by the program; it is not possible to link mailbox folders with particular emails unless you analyze the folders through other means first.

Users interested in the portable software can download it and its source from the developer homepage over at Admincraft. The software is compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit editions of Windows and requires the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5.

Closing Words and Verdict

Google webMail Filer For Thunderbird is a useful program for Windows users who want to move their emails from the desktop email client Thunderbird to Google's Gmail service.

Summary
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Author Rating
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5 based on 1 votes
Software Name
Google webMail Filer for Thunderbird
Operating System
Windows
Software Category
Email
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Comments

  1. JMGG said on January 19, 2012 at 8:25 am
    Reply

    You said that Outlook isn’t your main email client, so which is your main one?

    1. BalaC said on January 19, 2012 at 9:42 am
      Reply

      I think its thunderbird

    2. Martin Brinkmann said on January 19, 2012 at 10:15 am
      Reply

      It is Mozilla Thunderbird.

  2. Salaam said on September 24, 2012 at 9:52 pm
    Reply

    Awesome! This actually solved my problem… what a stupid bug.

  3. Claud said on December 19, 2012 at 2:08 am
    Reply

    If this is the same bug that I’ve encountered, there may be another fix: (1) hover over open Outlook item in Taskbar, cursor up to hover over Outlook window item, and right-click; (2) this should give you Restore / Move / Size / Minimize / Maximize — choose Move or Size; (3) use your cursor keys, going arbitrarily N/S/E/W, to try to move or size the Outlook window back into view. Basically, the app behaves as though it were open in a 0x0 window, or at a location that’s offscreen, and this will frequently work to resize and/or move the window. Don’t forget to close while resized/moved, so that Outlook remembers the size/position for next time.

    1. Lynda said on February 12, 2013 at 3:37 pm
      Reply

      THANK YOU Claude!!! I could get the main window to launch but could not get any other message window to show on the desktop. You are my hero!!!!

    2. Chad said on November 20, 2018 at 4:24 pm
      Reply

      Solved my issue! 6 years later and this is still problem…

    3. Ivan X said on January 21, 2021 at 4:50 pm
      Reply

      Fantastic. Thank you. Size did the trick.

  4. Andrew said on October 26, 2013 at 7:06 am
    Reply

    This solved my Outlook problem, too. Thank you. :)

  5. Charles said on December 7, 2013 at 7:23 pm
    Reply

    Thank you so much, this started happening to me today and was causing big problems. You are a life saver, I hope I can help you in some way some day.

  6. garth said on November 7, 2014 at 7:13 pm
    Reply

    You are a god – thank you!

  7. Faisal said on February 9, 2015 at 10:09 am
    Reply

    thanks a lot…. work like charm.. :-)

  8. Simon said on March 24, 2015 at 11:36 pm
    Reply

    Yah…thanks Claude. I’ve been having the same problem and tried all the suggestions…your solution was the answer. It had resized itself to a 0/0 box. Cheers

  9. Olu said on April 14, 2015 at 1:35 pm
    Reply

    Excellent post. This had me baffled even trying to accurately describe the problem. This fixed it for me.
    Thank you

  10. Coenig said on July 23, 2015 at 7:36 am
    Reply

    Thanks a lot for the article. Don’t know why it happenend, don’t know how it got fixed, but it was really annoying and now it works :-)

  11. Fali said on January 20, 2016 at 4:19 pm
    Reply

    Thanks a lot. I was facing this issue from past 3 week. I tried everything but no resolution. The issue was happening intermittently and mainly when I was changing the display of screen ( as i use 2 monitors). The only option i had was to do system restore. But thanks to you.

    1. MIki said on January 10, 2019 at 11:54 am
      Reply

      I’ve been tried to sole this problem for 12hours. Your comment about changing the display of screen helped me a lot!! Thanks!!

  12. Christina said on January 20, 2016 at 6:14 pm
    Reply

    Thank you…don’t know why this happened but your instructions helped me fix it. Running Windows 10 and office pro 2007

  13. Oz said on July 22, 2016 at 3:20 pm
    Reply

    Great tip! Thanks!

  14. Tracy said on September 1, 2016 at 4:48 pm
    Reply

    Worked for me, too – thank you!!!

  15. shawn said on September 9, 2016 at 10:25 am
    Reply

    It’s Worked for me, too
    thank you very much!

  16. Jari said on October 31, 2016 at 11:53 am
    Reply

    I had a similar issue with Outlook 2013 on Windows 10 and this helped me to fix it. Thank you very much!

  17. Michel H said on November 30, 2016 at 11:08 pm
    Reply

    Thank you so much. Solved!
    Considering you published this in 2012, incredible not been debugged by Microsoft.
    Thank you again. M

  18. Ziad Bitar said on January 9, 2017 at 2:00 am
    Reply

    This problem was faced by only one user logging to TS 2008 r2 using outlook 2010.The issue was resolved.

    Thanks.

  19. Anonymous said on February 15, 2017 at 5:24 pm
    Reply

    Great tip. Thank you!!!! If it helps, I had to use the Control Key and the arrow keys at the same time to bring my window back into view. Worked like a charm.

  20. Rochelle said on March 6, 2017 at 11:59 am
    Reply

    Thank you, this worked !!!!

  21. anom1234 said on May 20, 2018 at 11:20 pm
    Reply

    Man, you are a fucking god. Thanks a lot, what an annoying bug!!

  22. JC said on October 12, 2020 at 2:14 pm
    Reply

    Awesome, this post solved the issue. Many thanks!

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