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 change my email password in Thunderbird 91.7.0?

  • 2 replies
  • 2 have this problem
  • 2 views
  • Last reply by christ1

more options

I have had trouble getting mail on one (and only one) of my computers. When trying to send today, I received an error message in TB that I needed to change my password. I looked for a way to do this, but found none. I did, under preferences, look at stored passwords on the machine which is unable to send. Only an authentication password for Oath (Yahoo), remains, but the password to log in to my email account for both sending and receiving is gone. Both exist on my other machine. How do I re-enter my password for this account?

I have had trouble getting mail on one (and only one) of my computers. When trying to send today, I received an error message in TB that I needed to change my password. I looked for a way to do this, but found none. I did, under preferences, look at stored passwords on the machine which is unable to send. Only an authentication password for Oath (Yahoo), remains, but the password to log in to my email account for both sending and receiving is gone. Both exist on my other machine. How do I re-enter my password for this account?

All Replies (2)

more options

Since posting the question, I dug a bit further on the help site and found an answer dealing with an earlier version of Thunderbird on a Mac which provided a modicum of help. I now see how to change an existing password. The problem is, on this machine, the passwords no longer exist, at least not those pertaining to accessing my emails. The only remaining password is the app password, which didn't disappear with the rest. The password manager does not, unfortunately, provide a way to enter new entries directly.

When I go back to my inbox and ask TB to check for new emails, it connects to my mail server (because of the app password) but cannot access my account. TB never asks for me to supply a password, but doesn't advance past the message "Connected to pop.mail..." at the bottom of the window. For the record, I am using POP3 protocol, with OAuth2 authentication. My operating system is Windows 7.

When I try to send a test email, TB will eventually display a dialogue box with the message "Login to server smtp.mail... failed" and gives three buttons, including the choices: "Retry" "Cancel" and "Enter New Password." However, chosing "Enter New Password" apparently defaults to "Retry"; it doesn't give me any place to actually add a password, but reverts to the "Sending Message" dialogue box before returning to the "Login to server smtp.mail... failed" box. It is apparently an endless loop.

more options
I received an error message in TB that I needed to change my password. I looked for a way to do this, but found none.

Thunderbird is an email client application, it does not provide the service to transmit and receive emails. This is what email providers do, e.g. like Gmail or Yahoo. In a word, you cannot change your email account password in Thunderbird, because you do have an account with an email provider. You can tell Thunderbird to remember your account password thoigh, so that you don't have to type it again and again. So you'll need to log on to your account via webmail and change the password there. If in doubt contact your email provider for help or check their support site.

The only remaining password is the app password ... I am using POP3 protocol, with OAuth2 authentication.

With OAuth2 authentication no app specific password is needed, so you should delete it in Thunderbird. When prompted, enter your main account password.