Thunderbird - Moving messages to a local folder does not remove them from the Gmail All Mail folder

[mcuser457]

Dear all,

I am a long-term and very happy user of Thunderbird.

Some time ago, I realised that although using Shift+Del to permanently delete emails does remove them from Gmail's Inbox (back at Gmail's mail servers), they are still present on Gmail's servers in the All Mail folder. After a number of years of deleting using Shift+Del, my Gmail account got quite full, unnecessarily! I have largely dealt with this by deleting surplus messages from the All Mail folder and my usage (GB) of the Gmail account is much more sensible.

However, this morning I have discoverd that the same issue exists when moving (Move To) emails to a Local folder - the messages remain back at Gmail in the All Mail folder.

Is this a problem really with Thunderbird or Gmail (or maybe a bit of both), and what is the best way forward?

Thank you!

[tate]

This happens because Gmail uses labels instead of traditional folders. When you move an email out of the Inbox to a Local Folder in Thunderbird, Gmail simply removes the "Inbox" label, but the email remains archived in "All Mail."

To fully remove emails from Gmail after moving them to Thunderbird's Local Folders, you need to delete them from the "All Mail" folder. First, ensure that "All Mail" is visible in Thunderbird by subscribing to it. You can do this by right-clicking on your Gmail account in Thunderbird, selecting "Subscribe," and checking the box next to "All Mail." Once visible, navigate to the "All Mail" folder, select the emails you've moved to Local Folders, and press "Delete." This moves them to Gmail’s "Trash," where they will be permanently deleted after 30 days.

Alternatively, you can set up a filter in Gmail’s web interface to automatically delete emails after moving them to Local Folders in Thunderbird. However, this requires careful configuration to avoid unintended deletions.

[mcuser457]

Dear tate,

Thank you for your advice. It all makes perfect sense and I can see the logic. However ... I have tried to Subscribe to the "All Mail" folder. Unfortunately, "All Mail" is not listed as a folder (right-click on the Gmail account, select "Subscribe", then look for "All Mail" - tried that twice. "All Mail" is not listed, and all the folders (or so-called folders) that are shown are indeed already ticked. Any further thoughts?? This looks like being the preferred way of working rather than trying a filter within Gmail which, as you say, could have unintended results.

Thank you.

[siffemcon]

You can delete files in All Mail via the web interface. If you really want to do it via TB, go to https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#settings/labels > Labels tab > set All Mail to Show in IMAP. You may then have to subscribe as you tried before.

[mcuser457]

Yes! - thank you. Enabling Show in IMAP, then re-opening Thunderbird and Subscribing has worked. Thank you.

[TonkNZ]

For some reason in the filters app you can't select the "all mail" folder to work the filters on, it only lets you select "inbox", however if you run it manually within the filters app you can work directly on the "all mail" folder and it will delete things permanently.  Not sure why we can't use this functionality automatically, it would be a great addition.

[TonkNZ]

What i meant by "For some reason in the filters app you can't select the "all mail" folder to work the filters on" is if you change it from "inbox" to "all mail", it doesn't save the new location so once closed it and reopened it says "inbox" again, and therefore you can't run it automatically.

[siffemcon]

You can vote for and comment on that at https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/thunderbird-please-add-possibility-to-run-message-filters/idi-p....