From Outlook to Thunderbird and Back Again
The process of exporting email from Outlook to Thunderbird on Windows is really easy. Exporting it from Thunderbird and importing in to Outlook is not hard either, just time consuming. Both ways can be done.
Outlook to Thunderbird
This is actually really easy. The first thing you need is all your email in Outlook. Then, when you setup Thunderbird it will ask you if you want to import your Outlook email. Say yes and it does all the work. No, Thunderbird doesn’t have an import function for the PST file, but it can import anything that’s in Outlook on the same machine. It’s as easy as that.
Thunderbird to Outlook
This process is a bit more complex . Outlook doesn’t directly import Thunderbirds email, however with the right tools, and some time, it can be done.
The first thing you’ll need is a program called IMAPSize. It’s a free Windows application that has a built in tool called mbox2eml. This handy program is used to convert Thunderbird’s mbox email files into eml files. The mbox files are found in your Thunderbirds profile folder (usually in the mail -> local folders). If you don’t see any files with the extension mbox, then it’s the ones without an extension.
The downside here is that each folder you have in Thunderbird is a seperate mbox file. You have to convert each one. Anything in a sub folder will have to be converted too and you may start to loose your folder structure. Oh well, you can always put it back together later.
Once everything is in eml format, you must now startup Outlook Express! That’s right, Express. No need to setup an email account in there, but you should setup all your folders to mirror what you had in Thunderbird. Then, open the folders on your computer that were created from the mbox2email tool and drag the individual eml files into the corresponding Outlook Express folders. You can drag and drop as many eml files as you want, but you can’t drag in a folder. Once you’ve copied all your emails into Outlook Express, you can now import them into Outlook.
Startup Outlook, create your profile and once that’s all setup, go to Import/Export, import from another application and choose Outlook Express. If I remember correctly, it first said it couldn’t import the email then it asked me if I wanted to import all the email. I said yes and all the folders and emails were imported into Outlook.
So there you have it. Importing email from Outlook to Thunderbird is pretty simple and importing email from Thunderbird to Outlook can be done. Depending on how many emails and folders you have will determine how much time it will take. Defiantly going from Outlook to Thunderbird is easier and quicker!
For a much more detailed process of moving from Thunderbird to Outlook, check out this great tutorial: Export Thunderbird to Outlook.
Posted Friday, February 1st, 2008
Categories: Software, Thunderbird
Tags: email, mozilla, outlook, outlook-express
34 Responses to “From Outlook to Thunderbird and Back Again”
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I installed Thunderbird for a client who was using Outlook Express as part of the install it asked do i want to bring over the Address Book, Messages and Settings, I indicated Yes. That took some time, but once completed the messages did not come over and now I cannot find Outlook Express (the program) anywhere on the hard drive and of course lost months of emails!!!
Do yourself a favor and stop playing with toys that are for big people…
Uninstall thunderbird, and outlook express will be back.
I highly doubt Thunderbird would delete Outlook Express. Something sounds fishy there.
[...] From Outlook to Thunderbird and Back Again. [...]
Your description of transferring Outlook to Thunderbird is great – if they happen to be on the same computer. I’m looking for a way to move email from my work laptop to Thunderbird on my home desktop. Any ideas for that? Thanks.
Hi Bruce. What email client is your work laptop? If Outlook, can you install Thunderbird on the same machine for conversion purposes? Then move the files home?
Not a bad idea – it may be do-able for the short term purpose. Our security conscious IT department frowns on any extraneous software being loaded on corporate computers. Thanks.
Or do you have Outlook at home?
Outlook to Thunderbird
I used you suggestion and it appeared to work fine.
Most of the messages were well converted.
However, some of the messages are now displayed in html.
What happened?
Am looking at installing thunderbird on corporate computers and import outlook express 5 on macos.
if I import emails from express 5 to TB do I lose any emails from the express 5?
Whats the pros and cons?
GPO, I don’t see any reason why you’d loose emails. Just make backups before syncing to be sure.
Fernando, I’m unsure about your issue. I’m not well experienced with Outlook.
Hi,
Really helpful decription in exporting from one mail client to other. I just migrated from outlook to thunderbird. Really amusing to play with addons and themes.
Thanks for this nice explaination.
thank’s BRo
Wow, Fred, I bet you feel a lot better now that you’ve purged that!
I’ll concede your points as they relate to the original article, but I work in the technology field and “setup” and “startup” are often names of procedures or executable files. So there are times when they are appropriately used as nouns. Sadly, there are few things as definitive as you’d like them to be.
Hey! Great advice.. I’m stuck, however, at the Outlook Express part…. On my Vista laptop, there is no longer ‘Outlook Express’.. it’s been replaced by Windows Live – which just doesn’t seem to cut it.
Any suggestions about how to proceed from the ‘eml’ stage to the importing into Outlook stage without OE? Or is there someway to install OE without screwing up IE? Advice would be spectacularly welcome!
Don’t mind me… Windows Mail works the same as OE. I’m an idiot.
There is a good guide on how to convert from Outlook to Thunderbird: http://www.downloadsquad.com/2007/03/30/howto-thunderbird-and-ms-exchange-server/
^_^
Hello,
trying to convert from MS Outlook 2003 to Thunderbird (2.0.0.9), while the conversion completed succesfully, SOME of my PST folders, although ALL my emails were transfered, when I tried to open the emails, they appearred as HTML and not as text/rich text/word format .
Any idea on that ? How this can be fixed ?
Thank you for your time,
Panagiotis
For work with mails and possible other type files,advise try-how to recover .dbx files,tool helped me many times and has many possibilities,also program is free,it supports a great number of features, that turns email into a powerful tool to run business,program analyzes all files of dbx format from Outlook Express root directory and unpacks messages, even if these files are infected or seriously damaged,recover Outlook Express dbx file is compatible with Windows 2003, Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows NT 4.0, Windows Me and even Windows 98, that is currently not supported by Microsoft Corporation, all versions of Outlook Express are supported.
At work with mails advise try-outlook express dbx extractor,because this tool helped me many times,it can repair mailboxes in Outlook Express format and extract emails, when it is possible,repair messages from all folders and extract .dbx files, even from Deleted Items,moves to the preview mode, where our customers can take a look at the emails, that will be retrieved during the next stage,works with all Windows operating systems, starting from Windows 98 to Windows Vista (Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows 2003).
I installed IMAPSize 0.3.6 on Vista Home Premium but when I tried this procedure on TB 2.0.0.19 the result was an empty Inbox folder. I retried and got the same results. Any thoughts.
Thanks in advancefor your help.
Don
Hi, I cant understand how to add your site in my rss reader. Can you Help me, please
Hi, Thanks a lot for this information. The process worked like a charm. I tried looking at other sites, but the instructions were not clear. Thanks again. I like the look and feel of outlook better than Thunderbird, even though thunderbird is fast and doesn’t hog memory as outlook.
Hi,
I am testing Thunderbird client 2.0.0.21 at work. I imported all mails from Outlook 2007 to TB. All mails are available and did not lose the folder structure of local folders. Some issues i am facing:
1)I am not able to read many of the mails in local folders as it is in HTML code and not in normal mail message (rich text/text) format. I have to paste mail in notepad and convert to HTML before i can make any sense.
2)I have set up the GAL in TB. In Exchange, user properties have additional fields for Employee ID etc. which is not available in TB user properties.
Can someone please suggest a work around?
Many thanks in advance,
Veena
Veena hello,
please inform us how you make the import form Outlook2007 to TB successful.
As for the HTML, you may check the properties tab in TB for the specific folders, and make sure the options
“Apply default to all messages in the folder ….. “, for the encoding IS NOT checked, and that you have use the correcto Default Character Encoding (from the same screen, at the pull down menu)
See if that helps, and inform us,
Regards
Panagiotis
Hi,
I tried the method that you’ve specified and I got a lot of email errors and the need to do it folder by folder is a terrible mess.
Look this tutorial that I think it’s much better way to do the trick:
http://blog.nektra.com/main/2009/04/14/export-messages-and-folders-from-thunderbird-to-outlook-outlook-express/
Enjoy!
Hi,
I want my email (on my pc) that run under Ms Outlook to be open in my laptop which use Thunderbird. And want that my existing email in thunderbird join with the ex-Ms Outlook that I want to move. Is it possible?
Thanks a lot Thomas
I found the free MBOX to EML Converter tool, it works like IMAPSize but also detects the mbox version and headers type. Nevertheless the mbox to eml extractor is WIN32 utility, it can extract files of eml format from mbox mailboxes created by MAC OS X and Linux / Unix email software.
I installed thunderbird 3.0.4. but on setup it doesn’t ask me to import anything. I tried it twice, once with Outlook closed and once with Outlook open. When i use the import function and choose “import everything” thunderbird continues but shows nothing to import from. If i choose import > email it does work import all my outlook mail. Then i ran import once more to import my contacts.
I used outlook 2007 to import from.
How can I store thunderbird emails in outlook 2010… I have around 10 GB data in thunderbird account?
Please help if anybody can.
Mate, pain in the arse is what it is. It takes hours believe me. Thunderbird should be making an add-on or incorporating an export method that allows you to export to Outlook but it seems a bit of nazism is going on where they don’t want to do this. Fine for importing, absolute crap for exporting. I now fully regret using thunderbird. Don’t get me wrong, i liked thunderbird 2 because the account options were user friendly. Now some smartarse in their development team has decided everyone obviously must use email like them so they took away the option for POP accounts (automatically makes it imap) and if you don’t know how to change it (you have to stop the account setup at wizard) then it really pisses people off. The to top that off the idiots went and changed the storage options and i for the life of me hate the option because it doesn’t allow you to check a box to “delete messages from server” (like in thunderbird 2). Now we have an ambiguous statement in options that say delete messages from local AND server????????????????? (NOT ONE OR THE OTHER) When something is working donkeys then leave it be. Your going down the road of microsoft who love to play around with setting and changing options. Your going to lose alot of people this way and the only person you can blame will be your IDIOT developer who recommended it.
Go to this link.
http://blog.nektra.com/main/2009/04/14/export-messages-and-folders-from-thunderbird-to-outlook-outlook-express/
I pity you though if you have heaps of folders and subfolders…………………………
Does someone from Thunderbird wish to explain WHY they haven’t made an ADD ON that exports messages for Outlook????????? People have been waiting for years and all this non action just proves to me you guys are really not interested in making life easier, just more complicated.
Thank you for all the suggestions. They helped me with the problem of importing the TB mail messages from a StorageCraft image of the customers old computer HDD into his new PC running Outlook 2007.
BUT I would appreciate guidance on IMPORTING into Outlook Express or Outlook 2007 a Thunderbird Addressbook. You will all now say easy but please note you do not have the ability to run Thunderbird to perform an EXPORT.
To get the mail messages across I installed TB and somehow (blindly) eventually managed to get the mail into a TB profile then using IMapSize and finally MBOX2eml managed to get it all into OE. OE to Outlook 2007 is easy and anyone can do that.
So to summarize:
New XP PC running Outlook 2007, OE and TB Vers 3.04
StorageCraft ShadowProtect Image of the old PC. The TB client vers is unknown!
The mission should you wish to accept it is to get his address book from old TB vers across to Outlook 2007 (eventually)
I need to export emails from outlook express on my old computer to thunderbird on new computer. I didn’t have a chance to install thunderbird and transfer mails from OE before my computer crashed. However, I did export emails from OE and saved them on my flash drive they files in .dbx format.
Any way I can import them for thunderbird?