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

Setting up Thunderbird - Unable to log in at server...

  • 5 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 2 views
  • Last reply by cjh17000

more options

Hi,

I have 3 GMail accounts. I am the admin and sole user on all 3. I have just installed Thunderbird for the 1st time on a PC running Windows 10 Home, and am now trying to connect my accounts (using IMAP). These accounts have been connected on this same machine through MSOutlook for months, and have been working fine. I am connecting them across 2 different user profiles on the PC. Two of them have connected without issue, one on each of the user profiles, but with the 3rd, I keep getting the "Unable to log in at server..." error. The Name/email/password are all correct. I have tried connecting my 3rd email account (+New/Existing Mail Account) as the 2nd account on both of my profiles but I get the same error on both of them.

I have verified that Thunderbird is configured to accept cookies.

Is there some issue with having 2 GMail accounts linked to the same instance of Thunderbird?? (I hope not!! - that would be a complete deal-breaker!)

Is there anything else I can try?

Many thanks

Hi, I have 3 GMail accounts. I am the admin and sole user on all 3. I have just installed Thunderbird for the 1st time on a PC running Windows 10 Home, and am now trying to connect my accounts (using IMAP). These accounts have been connected on this same machine through MSOutlook for months, and have been working fine. I am connecting them across 2 different user profiles on the PC. Two of them have connected without issue, one on each of the user profiles, but with the 3rd, I keep getting the "Unable to log in at server..." error. The Name/email/password are all correct. I have tried connecting my 3rd email account (+New/Existing Mail Account) as the 2nd account on both of my profiles but I get the same error on both of them. I have verified that Thunderbird is configured to accept cookies. Is there some issue with having 2 GMail accounts linked to the same instance of Thunderbird?? (I hope not!! - that would be a complete deal-breaker!) Is there anything else I can try? Many thanks

Chosen solution

OK, problem solved. First I forced Thunderbird to create the account anyway, even though it couldn't connect (by clicking on "Advanced settings"), then I went into the manual config settings and made sure that the GMail imap and smtp servers were being selected (they weren't), and that SSL/TLS was selected with OAuth2 security. None of that was happening automatically for some reason. Finally, with all of that straightened out, it connected.

I still don't understand why 2 of my GMail accounts did all of that by themselves, but I had to build the 3rd one manually. Weird. Anyway, seems to be working now.

Read this answer in context 👍 0

All Replies (5)

more options

what is it that the account wizard is showing when you get this failure with regard to error message and settings?

more options

Hi Matt,

Thanks for replying. Not sure what you are referring to by "Account Wizard"...? Here's what I am doing/seeing: - New/Existing Mail Account - I fill out name, email address and password ('remember password' is checked), hit Continue - "Configuration found at email provider" - looks good up to here - IMAP selected by default, no change, hit Done "Unable to log in at server. Probably wrong configuration, username or password."

This is exactly what I did for my other 2 accounts, which both connected without issue...

Would love to know what I'm doing wrong!

Cheers.

more options

I have to wonder if IMAP is enabled in your account settings at google for that account, or if Thunderbird has been set as a blocked app. I don't know for sure, but google used to offer outlook connections as EAS, so it might work using that still. Or your outlook might be using POP for that account.

more options

Can you tell me what EAS is? :) I will check my Google settings for the other possibilities you mentioned. (The 3rd account is definitely not a POP account - I have been accessing it successfully from multiple devices without issue.)

more options

Chosen Solution

OK, problem solved. First I forced Thunderbird to create the account anyway, even though it couldn't connect (by clicking on "Advanced settings"), then I went into the manual config settings and made sure that the GMail imap and smtp servers were being selected (they weren't), and that SSL/TLS was selected with OAuth2 security. None of that was happening automatically for some reason. Finally, with all of that straightened out, it connected.

I still don't understand why 2 of my GMail accounts did all of that by themselves, but I had to build the 3rd one manually. Weird. Anyway, seems to be working now.