Yes, you can use Thunar. I used to install it because thumbnails would not show on my HP laptops until I had opened them once in Thunar. I now have a System 76 laptop so no longer install Thunar, but it worked when I used it. Remember Thunar is different, it is not a clone of nautilus/mate. You will find the preferences and how it works somewhat different.
Very nice reminder.
I have always been quite happy with Caja and never really thought of using another file manager. But with the latest updates of 20.10, there appeared - very occasionally, I must say - small glitches on using it. Like not reading subfolders.
Nothing that a simple restart cannot solve.
So perhaps it makes sense to try and use Thunar for a while.
To test, I changed preferred program to Thunar and just downloaded random stuff from internet. When download finishes, there is down-arrow indication for downloads, there we can choose to open the folder (open containing folder). When I click on it, what launches is Caja and not Thunar!
Edit: Just to be clear it is same issue even after logout-login as well as reboot.