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How can I tell thunderbird to use blue (like Outlook does) when I reply to an email?

  • 5 replies
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  • Last reply by Firefox

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I don't think thunderbird has (I haven't found it, anyway) the setting where I can set the default "reply color", but is there a plug-in that lets me set the reply color. What I want is when I reply to a message, it's that nice Outlook blue, not the default black. I don't want to manually have to change the reply text myself.

Thanks in advance,

I don't think thunderbird has (I haven't found it, anyway) the setting where I can set the default "reply color", but is there a plug-in that lets me set the reply color. What I want is when I reply to a message, it's that nice Outlook blue, not the default black. I don't want to manually have to change the reply text myself. Thanks in advance,

Modified by Firefox

All Replies (5)

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If you look under the Preferences menu and select Display in the Left Pane Formatting on the Top Tab Look Under Fonts and Colors, and click the Colors (button) on the right. Set your default Text, Link, and Background Colors in here and click 'OK' (see screenshot below for an idea) Close the Preferences Tab.

TB does not support automatic color changes in text, depending upon the quoted level of reply, like Outlook does ... this would be a great feature to Suggest if there isn't a plug in for it already.

Modified by Sea Mac

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Thanks, but I was looking for a way to just specify the reply, not the default, color.

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On a per email basis: Using the 'Formatting Bar' Click on the foreground font colour button, select a color, and press OK. then type.


If you only use Plain Text for sending whether this is set in Account Settings or whether you press and hold 'Shift' and click on 'Reply' to force a plain text. There is a way to change all the 'quoted text' of original email to another colour, this means the text you are typing is still the default - same as when composing a new mail, but clearly different from the 'quoted text'.

  • Exit Thunderbird.
  • Access 'profile name' folder.
  • Create a folder called 'chrome' in 'profile name ' folder.
  • Opening Notepad
  • Copy and Paste the code shown between lines below into Notepad.
  • Saving file as 'userContent.css' (spelt exactly in that way) save in 'chrome' folder.
  • Start Thunderbird.

see images below as guide.

IMPORTANT NOTICE: It has recently been noticed that when Firefox is sending posted comments as emails to recipients, they seem to mess up the code. The section with !important; is missing. So please view the code via the forum question to ensure you have correct code.

Note: where it says 'color:' you can choose whatever colour you want eg: black, blue, green, red etc You can also replace the colour name and use a hex code instead eg: color: #f50b19 !important;. This link provides hex codes: https://htmlcolorcodes.com/


/* Quoted text in plain-text replies */
span[_moz_quote=true] {color: maroon !important;}


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The above plain text stuff....you would use the info supplied by Sea Mac to set the default to blue for your text.

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No, I just meant the reply color itself as a default. Not the text color default. Thanks