If you haven’t heard of Thunderbird, we wouldn’t blame you. The once popular open source email client has all but faded to obscurity since its last major update. The desktop version is still stuck in the early 2000s. When it comes to mobile, the email client is non-existent. Since its glory days from 2003 to 2005, the email client hasn’t had much of a visual overhaul nor has it made any strides to have a mobile presence of any kind.
That’s changed with a recent tweet from Ryan Lee Sipes, the product manager for Mozilla Thunderbird. In which he noted that his number 1 priority will be to fix Thunderbird’s UI and UX. The change will be a very very welcomed update – this coming from someone who still uses the email client. However, there isn’t a firm date when the big update will be coming. That said, the desktop app is due for its anniversary update on June 28. Could it be one and the same?
Aside from that, it looks like Mozilla is significant progress towards creating a mobile app for Thunderbird. Mozilla has acquired the trademark rights and source code of K-9 Mail on Android. This includes its GitHub repository. Together with all the code and repositories, Mozilla has also hired Christian Ketterer (cketti), the project’s maintainer. What this essentially means is that Thunderbird’s Android app will be built using the pre-existing code from K-9 Mail. Thankfully, this also means that the development timeframe for a Thunderbird mobile app can be significantly shortened.
It seems like together with the new UX and UI for the desktop application, Thunderbird will also be getting Firefox Sync as feature Mozilla Firefox users will be familiar with. This feature will allow you to sync emails, drafts and more between your different Thunderbird installs on mobile and on desktops. I’m pretty sure that this will be a welcomed development for anybody who finds themselves working on multiple devices.
K-9 Mail is already available on the Google Play Store. So, if you’re interested in contributing to the future of Mozilla Thunderbird, you can install the app as it is updated with features that will be central to the new Thunderbird mobile experience. Of course, if you do use the K-9 Mail app, you will need to potentially brace yourself for multiple UI and UX changes as the Thunderbird team builds on K-9 Mail. Once they’ve achieved their development milestones, the K-9 Mail app will conceivably be changed to Mozilla Thunderbird.