Set up two IMAP accounts – one for Google mail and one for Office 365 mail. During setup, you will need to log in to your UW email accounts. Be sure you have your Duo device available for this.
When launching Thunderbird for the first time, you will see the screen below to add your account.
- Enter your name and UW email address. Do not enter your password here.
- Once you fill in the name and email address boxes, Configure manually will be available to click on. Do so. (DON’T click Continue.)
Add your Google email account first.
Modify the manual configuration info to match the screen shown below (most of the suggested information that is prefilled will be wrong). Your UW email address will be prefilled in the username box in both the incoming and outgoing section. Double check that all other settings exactly match those shown here. You do not need to test the configuration. Simply click Done.
Proceed through the Google sign in process. Duo authentication will be required.
Once Duo Authentication is completed, Allow Thunderbird to access your Google Account.
You should see a screen like the one below indicating you have successfully created your Google account in Thunderbird. Click Finish.
Note: if later in the initial setup process, you are asked a second time to allow Thunderbird access to your Google account, click allow again.
When asked to make Thunderbird the default mail client, click Skip Integration.
After creating the account, change the account name to easily identify each email account you set up.
- Mac users: From the Thunderbird menu, choose Account Settings. Account setting will open in a new tab in Thunderbird.
- Windows users: Click the “hamburger” (three bars) menu near the right end of the top bar of the app screen. Choose Account Settings. Account setting will open in a new tab in Thunderbird.
- Select the account you created in the account list on the left. It will currently be named as your email address.
- At the top of the Accounts Settings for this account, change the Account Name field similarly to what is shown below.
Add a second account for your Office 365 mail account.
Above the account you just created, click the New Account button. Select Mail Account….
You get a different account setup window this time. Enter your name and email address. Click Continue.
Enter your password and authenticate through Duo. Wait patiently while Thunderbird looks up configuration settings.
Thunderbird will eventually locate your UW Office 365 email account and bring up the next window. Click Edit Configuration. (DON’T click Continue.)
Click Advanced Config,
In the dialog box that pops up, click OK to confirm advanced configuration.
Mac users:
Windows users:
You will be taken back to the Account Settings tab. Your Office 365 account has been added but still needs to be manually configured correctly.
Click on the second account in left column list which will be named with your email address. Change the Account Name field to give this account an identifiable name as well.
Below the name of your Office 365 account, click Server Settings. Modify the settings to match those below. The username will be your UW email address. Double check that all other settings exactly match those shown here
In the left-hand list, scroll to the bottom and select Outgoing Server. In the list of Outgoing Server Settings, select the item that contains office365.com. Click Edit….
Modify the settings to match those shown below. Again, your username is your UW email address. (It may not be strictly necessary to update this smtp server’s settings but doing so will avoid possible error messages.)
Both email accounts should now be successfully added to Thunderbird. You can click the X on the Account Settings tab to close it. On the main Thunderbird tab, you will see both of your accounts listed on the left column. You can widen the left column if you can’t see the full account name identifying which is Google and which is Office 365.
Synchronize accounts in Thunderbird
Thunderbird will now synchronize your email accounts from the mail servers to the desktop application.
- Thunderbird will synchronize all Google mail labels as folders in your Google account.
- Thunderbird will only synchronize the Inbox in your Office 365 account by default, but you can synchronize additional folders by explicitly adding them. We will cover that in the section on copying email to Office 365.
You can see the progress of the sync by looking at the bottom bar of the Thunderbird window. This process may take a very long time (possibly days) if you have a lot of email.
Important: You must allow the synchronization process to complete before copying any email from your Google to your Office 365 account.
Keep your computer on (and keep it open, if it is a laptop), plugged in, and connected to the internet. It may be necessary to modify sleep settings to keep the computer awake so the sync completes as quickly as possible. When all email is fully sync’d there will be no messages shown in the lower bar of the program.
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