tbkeys is a bootstrapped extension for Thunderbird that uses Mousetrap to bind key sequences to custom commands.

• Download the tbkeys.xpi file from one of the releases listed on the GitHub releases page.
• Open the Add-ons Manager in Thunderbird (Tools->Add-ons).
• Click on the gear icon in the upper right and choose "Install Add-on From File..." and then select the downloaded tbkeys.xpi file.
• The add-on will self-update from the GitHub releases page when future updates are released.

The default keybindings are modeled on GMail's keybindings.

To customize keybindings, modify the "Key bindings" entry in the add-on's preferences pane which can be accessed from the add-on's entry in the Add-ons Manager ("Add-ons" in the Thunderbird menu). The "Key bindings" entry should be a JSON object mapping keybindings (with Mousetrap syntax as described here to javascript code to execute (see here for cmd name references). This old wiki page about Keyconfig also has some commands that are still valid. The Developer Toolbox (Tools->Developer Tools->Developer Toolbox in the menu) can be useful for poking around at the UI to find the name of an element to call a function on. The preferences page will not allow invalid JSON to be submitted, but it does not sanity check the keybindings otherwise.

Here are some commonly desired keybindings:

• Next tab: window.document.getElementById("tabmail-tabs").advanceSelectedTabs(1, true)
• Previous tab: window.document.getElementById("tabmail-tabs").advanceSelectedTabs(-1, true)
• Close tab: window.document.getElementById('tabmail-tabs').selectedItem.getElementsByClassName('tab-close-button')[0].click()
• Scroll message list: window.document.getElementById('threadTree').scrollByLines(1)
• Scroll message body: window.document.getElementById("messagepane").contentDocument.documentElement.getElementsByTagName("body")[0].scrollBy(0, 100)
• Create new folder: goDoCommand('cmd_newFolder')
• Subscribe to feed: window.openSubscriptionsDialog(window.GetSelectedMsgFolders()[0])