What are the benefits of using Thunderbird ?
 

I have always just went to google on my computer or the mail app on my phone but i was wondering what everyone thinks the benefits of using thunderbird might be ?

Hi...

I use Thunderbird as my primary POP3 client and I like the speed and (better) simplicity of using a mail client like this as opposed to accessing my mail via the browser (or web based services.) But that's just me. I think there are better options for SPAM filtering on Thunderbird than with the free web based mail providers, like Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail, etc. Using the paid services, from what I understand, offers you more options. Plus, with Thunderbird, there are also add-ons you can install that provide more features, functionality and services. :)

One potential downside, especially for Windows, is that in using POP3, you are bringing your mail, including any malware infected attachments, directly in to your computer. For someone using Linux, that's not really a big deal but for someone using Windows, that's an important consideration. IMAP is a little different and if your mail provider offers settings for this protocol, that's an option as well. :)

Regards...

When you use Thunderbird, you download a local copy of your entire mail box. This can be very advantageous when you lose your internet connection, Google goes down temporarily, or if you decide to move to a different email provider, for example. You can again use Thunderbird and IMAP to upload all of your emails, incoming and outgoing, to the new account, without losing anything in the transition.

I know a lot of people who trust the "cloud" with their life. They ALL, every one of them, have ended up losing something of great importance at some point because of it. If you care about the data, make a local copy, and make a backup of that copy. Thunderbird is an easy way to make a backup of your mail box, and is a useful mail tool at the same time. I find it much more convenient to fire up Thunderbird vs opening up a web browser, navigating to gmail, logging in, etc.

I can't find a thunderbird app in the play store is there a way to get it on to my phone as well.

Hi...

Unfortunately, there is no version of Thunderbird for Android. :(

Regards...

Most of my email is from non-google providers, whose app interface is somewhat simplistic, and I have several of them. I don't want to open that many browser tabs just for email. Thunderbird (actually Iceowl, but who really cares) works for that, and I can get all my email in one place. For Android, I use CloudMagic, which does the same thing. The GMail app will do that also, but I prefer CloudMagic.