Mozilla planning to launch an email service: Thundermail
From https://blog.thunderbird.net/2025/04/thundermail-and-thunderbird-pro-services/
Thundermail is an email service (with calendars and contacts as well). We want to provide email accounts to those who love Thunderbird, and we believe that we are capable of providing a better service than the other providers out there. Email that aligns with our values of privacy, freedom and respect of our users. No ads, no selling or training AI on your data – just your email and it is your email.
With Thundermail, it is our goal to create a next generation email experience that is completely, 100% open source and built by all of us, our contributors and users. Unlike the other services, there will not be a single repository where this work is done. But we will try and share relevant places to contribute in future posts like this.
The email domain for Thundermail will be Thundermail.com or tb.pro. Additionally, you will be able to bring your own domain on day 1 of the service.
and https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/02/thunderbird_pay_services/ mentions
Thundermail, an email hosting service based on the Stalwart stack, to complement the Thunderbird client. Stalwart supports JMAP (JSON Meta Application Protocol), intended as a successor to IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol).
Will they manage to make it work in the long term?
Comments
They have built their userbase on socialist principles and now are in deep shit because their users don't understand money is needed for any service to function.
It has been sad to witness Mozilla downfall, but it was destined to happen since day one.
The least shitty way to navigate it, if i were in their shoes, would be to sell licenses. I would be willing to purchase open source Firefox "founders edition" or something.
Instead they have chosen to betray pretty much all of their principles and start shoving ad's, trackers and other unwanted shit in to their products. Which in turn made their previous, "donate" business model obsolete, because at this point its like donating to Google and nobody wants to do it.
I don't think it will go anywhere, probably will end up like Vivaldi Email used by tens of people.
I honestly don't believe the financial struggles of Mozilla are caused by the user base. The issue is more with the leadership and the years of Mozilla ignoring their user base.
The user base really struggles nowadays to give any money to Mozilla because they immediately waste it on some Silicon Valley startup nonsense. Most users want Mozilla to develop Firefox with a focus on privacy. Mozilla, on the other hand, buys a bunch of failed startups and launches (currently) trendy projects, only to scrap them a year later. And because all of this works so well, they increase management salaries. I think a huge chunk of the user base just doesn't trust Mozilla to handle any potential donations responsibly.
This feels like yet another one of their already dead projects. I also struggle to understand who they think the customers will be. By using Stalwart and the general Mozilla branding, it feels like they want to refocus on privacy. But with the service being hosted on US-based Google Cloud servers, I have a strong feeling that people will prefer other services like ProtonMail.
So, the only people who are likely to use it are probably the 10 hardcore Thunderbird fans.
Will get closed down in a year or two, like the others: https://killedbymozilla.com/
Sounds like these features aren't enough to distinguish them from other email service providers.
Got an invite now to join their early bird access - paying full price for being a beta tester. See https://tb.pro/ for details.
Its the way Brave went with, and If it was Firefox instead, I would've bought it. I don't have anything against Brave or their devs or whatever, but I'm just not a fan of Chromium engine.
https://brave.com/origin/
Hosted on AWS which isn't exactly privacy friendly. I cannot say what they use for outbound, but I suspect its AWS SES.
Overpriced for what it is, imo. It's just normal Email provider with the "thunderbird look" hosted on big tech platform, which once again goes against early Mozilla principles. They must be allergic to making money.
$6
per month,
paid annually
NOPE!
59,99 $
NOPE.
Their SPF record has:
Honestly I don't think it's a bad idea for them. Having another big player like Mozilla for email isn't bad. Yeah it's $6/m, not for me, not for most of us here, but there's people that will use it and prefer it to other options like Google, Proton, etc.
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There are different levels of privacy.
Proton provides the most privacy, as everything is end-to-end encrypted. Or well, they technically can still read all your e-mail when it comes in or goes out, because that's how e-mail works. But generally, it's the most privacy friendly.
Thundermail, I think, is right in between Proton and Gmail/Outlook/Yahoo. The latter three harvest every bit of data they can get their hands on. Thundermail likely won't. It balances privacy and convenience in a way that may appeal to people. After all, Proton's end-to-end encryption does provide usability challenges.
There's a quote, "organizations don't die because of starvation, but because of indigestion". Killing off services that don't make money and/or contribute to core business can be a wise choice.
Same here.
I mean, it's kind of a "why not" situation, things got a bit hairy in the browser market there for a while, but given the absolute shit show that is Thunderbird, you would have thought if they wanted to get in the email game, they would have sorted that out first as a confidence and "we are serious" to give a bit of confidence.
Anyway, not something I imagine I will ever touch, too many other proven options for me, but never say never, if they manage to do something meaningful differently, then why not.
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From a price point, it's a bit expensive, but still reasonable if you're open source supporter.
But the problem is the reliability and stability. I don't want to invest in something, especially email, where the provider can go kaput anytime.
TBF, that's a risk you can mitigate by using your own domain. A closure is unlikely to be sudden (overnight), so you could move old emails to a new provider as long as they support some sort of import.
However, I'm having a hard time coming to terms with the price. I pay for Proton, which comes with more storage, more features and E2EE when emailing other Proton users. It costs more but there's clear ROI on that spend. Besides IMAP, Thundermail has no advantage. And Proton's own apps are good enough that I don't miss IMAP.
But as was mentioned earlier in the thread, Mozilla has a management problem more than a money problem. If they would kindly sit down and keep building a great browser (that I can use forks of...), they wouldn't be so desperate for cash all the time. Too many side quests.
Must be unused space on rented servers from this newly started firefox vpn.
Price hike = kill services? Even its a foundation, i dont think it will go the long run, max 3-4y before closing it.
With that price not everyone tries this service, but only one month is enough, to create a mess on this, especially mention spamming.
Wonder if they come up with a 30day free testing option.
Fair enough.
Yeah, I hate that part of the Org, but I use Firefox/Thunderbird daily.
Q: Where will my data be hosted?
A: Your emails are protected by strict EU privacy laws and hosted on infrastructure you can trust. With servers located in Germany, Thundermail prioritizes your privacy while ensuring reliable, fast delivery worldwide.
[ facepalm.jpg ]
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I like Thunderbird, but I prefer to self-host my email. Except for outgoing; I use mxroute for that.
Debian was right all along, that's why they want to rebrand the Firefox they shipped.
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https://lowendspirit.com/discussion/comment/221016/#Comment_221016