Thunderbird does not see contacts in macOS Contacts
Thunderbird does not seem to see the contacts in the macOS Contacts app.
When writing a new email, email addresses in Contacts do not appear in the "To" field even if you type in the whole name. I checked the macOS AddressBook in Thunderbird and it appears empty (even though there are hundreds of contacts in the Contacts app).
All prefs in Thunderbird and Contacts seem to be set correctly. I've tested using Thunderbird 78.12.0 and 91.0.3 running on High Sierra 10.13.6. I've even re-installed the apps (in different order).
I've read a lot of threads about similar problems, but I have not found anything on this exact problem. Any help would be very much appreciated. Thank you in advance.
All Replies (7)
I do not use apple products, but there is a setting in the apple OS that has to be stitched to allow non apple products access to the address book.
This thread outlines the things you have to do in apple operating system.
Thank you very much for the reply. You refer to "this thread" that may contain information for me, but it's not clear to me which thread? Was your response supposed to contain a link to another thread?
Please let me know. Thanks again for your time.
Matt, I'm still not sure what thread you were refering to but you got me thinking in the right direction and I found the solution. Thank you.
Just in case anybody else runs into this issue, here is the solution:
In System Preferences go to Privacy & Security. Select the Privacy tab and click the checkbox beside Thunderbird. Make sure you reboot the computer, not just the app.
Again, thanks for the response. Cheers.
Sorry about that. It is old, from the time apple introduced the thing I think. My memory is fading I think..
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1269923#answer-1258132
I'm having the exact same problem on an M1 MacBook Air. But when I go to System Preferences > Privacy > Contacts, there is no option to select Thunderbird. There's also no way to manually add it.
Has anyone run into this?
Hi Matt Milano,
I use an older mac running High Sierra so it's possible that Big Sur integrates Thunderbird differently, or perhaps you have found a bug. That being said....
I suggest you reboot, update or re-install the Thunderbird app because it appears to not be fully "presenting" itself to the OS. Obviously mac reboot as well.
One other possibility might be to check your default email client selection in Thunderbird general prefs. I point out that in High Sierra it is not necessary to be default client but maybe not the case in Big Sur.
Frank Lee
franklee1 said
Hi Matt Milano, I use an older mac running High Sierra so it's possible that Big Sur integrates Thunderbird differently, or perhaps you have found a bug. That being said.... I suggest you reboot, update or re-install the Thunderbird app because it appears to not be fully "presenting" itself to the OS. Obviously mac reboot as well. One other possibility might be to check your default email client selection in Thunderbird general prefs. I point out that in High Sierra it is not necessary to be default client but maybe not the case in Big Sur. Frank Lee
Unfortunately, I did all of that. Nuked all the Thunderbird preference files and reinstalled it three times. I've set it as the default client, and checked, unchecked and checked the 'Use macOS Contacts' option. Still no go.
I came up with the same theory that Thunderbird is not properly requesting access to the Contacts.