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delete old mail folders from Thunderbird profile for removed accounts

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  • Last reply by Toad-Hall

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I have removed several old POP3 accounts from Thunderbird and moved the files to the local folders before deleting the mail folders from within Thunderbird. The profile folder in windows still contains all the old data and folders from the deleted accounts including those deleted several years ago. Can I just delete these old folders from the profile directory or will there be other consequences? I do not want to completely recreate the profile from scratch as I always have problems with reconfiguring my multiple email accounts.

I have removed several old POP3 accounts from Thunderbird and moved the files to the local folders before deleting the mail folders from within Thunderbird. The profile folder in windows still contains all the old data and folders from the deleted accounts including those deleted several years ago. Can I just delete these old folders from the profile directory or will there be other consequences? I do not want to completely recreate the profile from scratch as I always have problems with reconfiguring my multiple email accounts.

Chosen solution

The reason the old account data is still shown in the profile name folder is to allow those who delete/remove accounts in error to be able to recover the account/emails.

If you have correctly removed the accounts via the 'Account Settings' window so they no longer display in 'Account Settings' nor Folder pane and you are confident that you no longer need to recover anything in those old accounts, you can delete the accounts from the profile name folder. If concerned you can always copy the 'profile name' folder to an external device as a backup. Please make sure Thunderbird is closed whilst doing this.

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Chosen Solution

The reason the old account data is still shown in the profile name folder is to allow those who delete/remove accounts in error to be able to recover the account/emails.

If you have correctly removed the accounts via the 'Account Settings' window so they no longer display in 'Account Settings' nor Folder pane and you are confident that you no longer need to recover anything in those old accounts, you can delete the accounts from the profile name folder. If concerned you can always copy the 'profile name' folder to an external device as a backup. Please make sure Thunderbird is closed whilst doing this.