How to Backup Thunderbird Emails to External Hard Drive

As a professional, there can be plenty of instances when we require to backup Mozilla Thunderbird Emails to an External Hard Drive, Computer or any other email client to ensure that our important email information secure. If you’re one of them and seeking a solution to backup Thunderbird Emails to External Hard drive, then continue reading.

What is Mozilla Thunderbird Email?

In contrast to other email clients, Mozilla Thunderbird client is an open source web-based email client that is used by numerous professionals and individuals to exchange or send emails in order to transfer important information. The Mozilla Thunderbird program can support IMAP, POP & LDAP address, and is able to function effortlessly across Windows, Linux and Mac OS.

Related Blog: How to Import Lotus Notes Contacts to Thunderbird

Thunderbird Profile Location in Windows OS

Before proceeding, let’s be aware of the address of the Thunderbird Email Database in Windows OS:

  • Go to the Start Menu and type “%appdata%”in the search box.
  • Select your Roaming option that is displayed in the menu.
  • In the Windows Explorer ,click choose
  • Click on Profile. Here you can find all the folders for your profile that are saved in your PC.

NoteYou can also follow C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\\. Find where to see your Thunderbird profile.

Why There is a Need to Copy Thunderbird Emails to the Hard Drive?

  • System was physically damaged.
  • Data corruption caused by abrupt power shut down.
  • The system files were damaged due to viruses.
  • Risk of losing data when moving emails between Thunderbird mail client to another.

How to Backup Thunderbird Emails to External Hard Drive?

There are many ways to backup Mozilla Thunderbird emails to Hard Drive. Some of them are listed below:

Method 1. Save as Option – A simple method of downloading Thunderbird emails locally

It is a common method of saving Thunderbird emails to an external hard drive or on a computer.

  • Open Mozilla Thunderbird application.
  • Choose the emails you wish to save to the external drive.
  • Click the Menu button, then click on Save as from the drop-down menu.
  • Select the save location by entering the folder’s name in order to save the email you want to save.
  • After that, press the Save button in order to have the backup process started to your PC.

Method 2: ImportExportTools Add-on to Export Thunderbird Emails

There is no built-in function for exporting emails in Thunderbird directly to hard drive. To transfer emails from Thunderbird to an external hard drive or other format such as EML, MBOX, HTML, PDF, Spreadsheet, etc. In order to do this, you must include the ImportExportTools extension.

  • Install Mozilla Thunderbird on your PC.
  • Click on Thunderbird Menu icon displaying at the upper-right corner.
  • Now, Click to add-on under the dropdown menu.
  • Click on the “Add-ons” button in Add-ons Manager.
  • Choose the Import/ExportTools add-on.
  • Click here to Add to Thunderbird
  • Select “Install” option to add the extension to you Thunderbird client.
  • Then, return into The add-ons manager window and click the Restart now button to stop the procedure.
  • Click on Right-click in the Inbox and select the ImportExport Tools.
  • Then select the messages to export in the folder and select EML Format.
  • Choose a preferred saving option to save backup files.

Related Post: How to backup emails, contacts, and profiles in Thunderbird?

Method 3: Save and Backup Mozilla Thunderbird Profile

Another method is to save Thunderbird emails to an external hard drive. Mozilla Thunderbird saves information in the form of a series of files known as Profile. Here are the steps you can follow to save Thunderbird profile information.

  • Launch the Mozilla Thunderbird application and click on menu
  • In the drop-down menu, select the Help option.
  • Then, go to Help and then click Troubleshooting Tips.
  • Select the open Folder (Local Drive) option in the application’s basics.
  • When you click the Open Folder button it opens the user’s Profile directory.
  • Then Copy The Users Profile folder, and then paste it in the location you prefer, like the external drive, or another place to be able to access it.

Backup Thunderbird Emails to external hard drives using Professional Tool

The three methods above are completely free to use. However, it requires level of technical expertise to follow these steps to export Thunderbird Emails to Hard Drive. However, Thunderbird Email Backup Tool does not require any technical expertise and is a simple software. It’s a powerful and reliable tool for backing up the contents of your Mozilla Thunderbird profile data to hard drive, external hard drive, computers, or other email clients like Gmail, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail, Office 365 and more.

The Bottom Line:

In this blog, we’ve discussed how to use Mozilla Thunderbird, its location and the steps for backup Thunderbird Emails to External Hard Drive with the assistance of manual and expert assistance. You can choose any method to backup Thunderbird email locally.