This site will have limited functionality while we undergo maintenance to improve your experience. If an article doesn't solve your issue and you want to ask a question, we have our support community waiting to help you at @FirefoxSupport on Twitter and/r/firefox on Reddit.

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

How do I stop Thunderbird from Re-Formatting my forwarded email?

  • 8 replies
  • 6 have this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by Toad-Hall

more options

Every time I try to forward and html-formatted email to another recipient, the html-formatted email is changed to courier font , all formatting is removed, the text appears bunched up on the left side of the text field, each line occupying only 1/3 of the normal horizontal email line available in the body area and any images attached to the original email are omitted in the forwarded version. How can I preserve the original email's formatting when forwarding that email to another recipient? It's really frustrating.

I have already selected to send emails in html format in the options menu when composing email. There is no similar choice to format (i.e. preserve the native format of) email that I choose to forwarded to another recipient.

Presently the only way to forward readable email is to copy the original email sent to me and paste in a newly composed email, where is remains properly formatted, then reattach attachments from the original email to the new composition. Really tedious.

Thanks in advance for any help with this.

ChickNew

Every time I try to forward and html-formatted email to another recipient, the html-formatted email is changed to courier font , all formatting is removed, the text appears bunched up on the left side of the text field, each line occupying only 1/3 of the normal horizontal email line available in the body area and any images attached to the original email are omitted in the forwarded version. How can I preserve the original email's formatting when forwarding that email to another recipient? It's really frustrating. I have already selected to send emails in html format in the options menu when composing email. There is no similar choice to format (i.e. preserve the native format of) email that I choose to forwarded to another recipient. Presently the only way to forward readable email is to copy the original email sent to me and paste in a newly composed email, where is remains properly formatted, then reattach attachments from the original email to the new composition. Really tedious. Thanks in advance for any help with this. ChickNew

All Replies (8)

more options

Please Confirm you are using all these settings;

'Tools' > 'Account Settings' > 'Composition & Addressing' for mail account Select 'Compose Messages in HTML format'


Click on 'Global Composing Preferences' button Options window opens on 'Composition' > 'General' tab select; 'forward messages 'Inline'

click on 'Send Options' button select 'Send the message in both plain text and HTML' click on OK

Click on OK to close Options window. Click on OK to save and close Account Settings window.

more options

I have already selected those settings, but the problem persists.

Thank you.

more options

Hold down shift whilst clicking on Reply or Forward. Not a fix, but a workaround.

more options

It sounds like the 'Forward' email is being changed to Plain Text.

Does the 'Formatting Bar' also disappear?

What happens if you hold down 'Shift' key and then click on 'Forward' button?

more options

When clicking on Forward, the email IS being changed to plain text, and yes, the formatting bar disappears.

If I hold down the shift key while clicking on Forward,....it doesn't help at all. The message is still unformatted and looks terrible.

Interestingly, if I click on Reply this problem doesn't occur...the formatting is preserved.

So to summarize the problem is with forwarding only, and this behavior is unchanged even if I hold the shift key while clicking Forward.

Very strange and frustrating....

more options

Is it any different if you open the original message by double-clicking it then forwarding from the new window/tab? Or do you do it this way already? I know that some html is rendered differently in the Message Pane versus the separate view. And some add-ons which interact with message content type are sensitive to which view you use when working with your messages.

more options

No difference when I double click (the standard procedure to forward). I have tried just selecting the message in the message list and clicking on the Forward button, and it still unformats the document.

Good idea, though. Thank you.

more options

What version of Thunderbird are you using?