Vista Windows Mail messages to Windows 11 Mail

I have copied the entire Vista Windows Mail (not Live) folders which have all the messages in eml ; I have also exported the folders (for some reasons, the export gives me a bunch of folders like inbox , outbox and draft instead of a Outlook pst file (though I am using Windows Mail) . I am wondering if there is a way to import these old mail messages to Windows 11 Mail (I am reluctant to use Outlook because I need to activate it, etc). I just want a simple mail client to send and receive messages . Windows 11 Mail is all set up and working but I want to keep all the old messages . Any way to achieve this ? I can't find any import function to migrate the old messages to the new email client. I am using IMAP/SMTP , old messages are all moved to local mail folders and so they are not available on the mail server any more. Where does Windows Mail store email messages in Windows 11?

P.S. I have read this thread but doesn't seem to help my case.

Thanks

Windows Mail for Vista did support local folders but Mail for Windows 10/11 does not, your messages remain on the servers so import isn't an option. Thunderbird can read .eml and supports local folders so you might want to do what I do, using Mail as my default email client and TBird for when I need its additional facilities. All messages appear in both clients of course.

I can't explain it but I did get it to work! The bad news is I cannot reproduce it (yet perhaps).

I exported mail from Vista, thumb drived it the Win 11 Outlook where they were EML files (seemed odd), and then dragged then into Outlook. It worked, seriously. I was shocked.

If I can reproduce it I will update this post.

Hi:

This is what I did. As I mentioned, I exported the messages from Windows (Vista) Mail which results in several folders in which there are different folders Inbox , Sent , draft and deleted , etc . I simply created some local folders in Thunderbird and copy and pasted the eml files from different exported folders into their appropriate local folders in Thunderbird. I can read those older messages with no problems , so this is a combination of what Fixer and Zinc have suggested. Thank you guys.

just want to add Thank you guys or gals.

The Edit button for post disappears after a while ?