Thunderbird, by the Mozilla Foundation, is a Free and Open Source email client. It allows you to connect to a plethora of email providers, allowing you to view, compose, send and receive email. It is free, and is available on Windows, Linux, and Apple Mac.
It is no secret that we absolutely adore this email client, particularly as a drop in replacement for Microsoft's legacy software 'Outlook'.
Cloud Matrix proudly donates monthly to the Mozilla Foundation, to ensure that you have access to robust, free and open source tools like Mozilla Thunderbird.
Let's get started with adding an IMAP email account to Thunderbird, so you can start sending and receiving emails today.
Overview
- Download Thunderbird, the email client software.
- Add your email address and password.
- Configure the email address manually.
Download Thunderbird
- If you don't already have Thunderbird installed on your machine, you'll want to do this first. From your PC's web browser, preferably Firefox ;), head on over to https://www.thunderbird.net/en-US/ and click on the big green 'Free Download' button.
- Once downloaded, run the installation process for your operating system. While software installation falls outside of the scope of this tutorial, the following repository of articles may be useful to you: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/products/thunderbird/install-migrate-and-update
- Once the installation is completed, Thunderbird will open, and you will be asked to 'Set Up Your Existing Email Address'.
Set up your existing email address
- This process is generally the same for most email clients. You are asked to input; email address, password, and a name, which could be the name of your company, the position of the person manning the mailbox, or your full name / nickname. The third option is up to you, but the email address and password MUST match the email address and password created on your mail server.
- Click the blue 'Continue' button. Thunderbird will try to find the mail server settings related to your email address.
- Optionally, if you know your mail server settings and you would like to manually configure the mailbox, you can select 'Configure manually'.
- IMAP is the recommended configuration across all of our servers, as it allows for cross device synchronisation. Choose IMAP and select the blue 'Done' button.
That's it! If all went well, your email account should be set up and ready to start sending and receiving through Thunderbird.
Note: If you are not sure if your mailbox has been added to the mail server, check in the control panel that comes with your hosting account, or contact our support team via the client area, or by sending an email to support@cloudmatrix.co.za.
Manual configuration (optional).
You may want to configure your mailbox settings manually for a number of reasons:
- The automatic configuration fails,
- You have a custom email server that you want to connect to,
- You want to use a custom hostname,
- etc.
If you've selected the 'Configure manually' button, then you will be prompted to input the server details, as follows:
The standard mail server settings normally follow a template, specifically;
Protocol: IMAP or POP for incoming, and SMTP for Outgoing
Hostname: mail.[your-domain]
Incoming Port: 993 for IMAP, and 995 for POP.
Outgoing Port: 465 for SMTP
Authentication method: Normal password
Connection security: SSL/TLS
Username: Your full email address, [user]@[your-domain]
Password: The password for your email address, set at server level. This is normally set or reset through a control panel such as Plesk, cPanel, or ISPConfig, depending on which package you've chosen with us.
Note: These are secure settings, i.e. using SSL/TLS security, which is highly recommended. For insecure settings, please contact support.
It is likely that the 'Done' button will be grayed out. To override this and proceed with setting up the account, select the 'Advanced config' option, and choose 'OK' on the 'Confirm Advanced Configuration' dialog to force the new account to use the settings you have input.
That's it! If all went well, your email account should be set up and ready to start sending and receiving through Thunderbird.
Conclusion
Thunderbird is one of the best email clients available for creating, reading, sending and receiving email. We've shown you how to connect your domain email to Thunderbird automatically and manually.
As always, if you get stuck, feel free to open a support ticket with us, and one of our hosting agents will guide you through the setup.
