How to Delete or Deactivate Your Facebook Account

In this article, you will learn how to delete, deactivate, and reactivate your Facebook account. You will also learn what is the difference between deactivating and deleting an FB account. It happens the most when people who are using Facebook for so long and wanna quit immediately. There might be many possible reasons for leaving FB, but that is none of my concerns and I will take you straight forward to the procedure of deleting or deactivating a Facebook account.

Facebook allows users to deactivate or delete their FB accounts. Deleting a Facebook account is totally different than deactivating it. I will show you both these procedures/differences with steps and screenshots, also the things you need to take care of before deleting an FB account. So please keep on reading…

Difference Between Deactivating and Deleting Facebook Account

Let me show you what is the difference between deactivating and deleting. When you deactivate your FB account:

• It may temporarily be hiding you from your friends and the public.
• People won’t see your appearance online on Facebook.
• It is temporarily disabling your account.
• No one can find you using your email address, username, phone number, etc.
• Your timeline will get hidden from others and no one will find it.
• The best part about deactivating is you can get access to your account to activate it whenever you want to go live.

Please keep in mind that there is still some information that will be visible to users on Facebook. For example, all the text messages, voice chats, and video messages you have sent to others. It is an immediate action you can take to make your FB account disappear and Facebook won’t delay this process. When you delete your FB account:

• Your account will be permanently deleted.
• Not you nor others can regain access to it.
• Your FB data will completely be wiped and no one can recover it.

This process takes up to 14 days after you have made the deletion request. It means that within 14 days you can cancel the request and can use your account. However, after 90 days all your data is gonna get disappeared. After you make the decision and press the delete button, all your FB information is not accessible or public.

Some information like messages you have sent to others will remain in their account (chat) until they delete it. But you don’t worry about that, the only thing they see is your profile name as a “Facebook user”.

Access and Download your Facebook Data First

Since you’ve created your Facebook account, all of your information and data are accessible and downloadable. You can download a complete copy of your FB data and info anytime you want. However, it is a password-protected process, and only you will have access to get/download it. If you don’t know your password and want to reset it here is the process you need to take a look at. To access and review your information:

1. Click your profile photo at the top right.
2. Now click Settings & Privacy then Settings.
3. Then click Privacy and Your Facebook Information on the left side menu.
4. Click View next to Access your information.

It is better to review all of your information before deleting your Facebook account. However, you will find the below list of information there. Facebook has categorized the below info there for easy access and management.

• Posts: All of the posts you have shared on Facebook with your friends e.g your posts, posts you are tagged in, other people’s posts on your timeline, notes, and polls.
• Photos and Videos: Your photos on Facebook you have uploaded and shared, all photos and videos you are tagged in, and your videos.
• Comments: All Facebook comments you posted on your own posts including photos and videos etc.
• Like and Reactions: It includes all of your likes and reactions on pages, posts, and comments on both public and individual posts.
• Friends & Requests: This section includes people you are connected to (mean your friends list). Request you have sent to others and received from others as well removed ones.
• Following and Followers: You will find people, businesses, organizations, pages, and places, where you choose to see content and other posts. Also your followers.
• Messages: Your sent and received messages on Facebook and Messenger.
• Groups: Your groups on Facebook you own, membership activities, joined groups, your posts, and other comments in groups you belong to.
• Events and Profile Info: Your shared events on Facebook, events you have responded to, and events invitations. Profile information includes your contact info, about, life, music interest, etc.
• Marketplace: All your activities on the Facebook marketplace, such as selling products on the marketplace and much more.
• Pages and Payment History: You will find all the pages you are an admin of and the payment history you have made via FB.
• Save Item and Collections: Every you have saved to watch later on Facebook, such as posts, videos, photos, events, and much more.
• Your Places: A complete list of places you have created on Facebook, such as names of the places, locations, time and date, etc.
• Apps and Websites: This information category includes the apps you admin of, posts from apps and websites and personal blogs, etc.
• Other Activities on Facebook: Last but not least this info category includes pokes you have given and received as well as interactive videos. Moreover, other info such as Ads related, to you, search history, location details, security, and logins.

First, download a copy of your Facebook information

To immediately get a copy of your FB information or data and other thing mentioned above please follow these steps:

1. Click your profile picture at the top right.
2. Click Settings & Privacy then Settings.
3. Now click Privacy then click Your Facebook Information in the left side menu
4. Click View next to Download your Information.
5. Choose Date Range All of My Data, File format as HTML, Media Quality as Medium.
6. Then click the Request a Download button at the bottom.

Once done, Facebook will notify you your Data Copy is ready to Download. Go to Available Copies. Download your information and data copy.

While combining your data in one HTML file, Facebook will take time, so please be patient with that. Moreover, the download will take time, it depends on the size of the file and the speed of your internet connection. You can then view your files using Google Chrome or any other browser.

How to Delete a Facebook Account

When you delete your account it’s permanent and once you initiate the deletion process. It will take up to 30 days to complete the deletion, you can cancel the process within one month, if not then no one can regain your Facebook account.

However, my suggestion is to download a copy of all of the information you have added on Facebook. Then follow these steps. To permanently delete your Facebook account:

1. Click your profile picture at the top right.
2. Select Settings & Privacy and go to Settings.
3. Click Accounts Center on the left side menu.
4. Now click Personal Details > Account Ownership and Control.
5. Select Delete Account and click Continue to account deletion.
6. Enter your password to confirm, then click Continue.
7. Again click Delete Account.

Note that if you change your mind within 30 days and wanna cancel the account deletion then follow these steps.

Cancel Facebook account deletion:

1. Just log in to your Facebook account.
2. You will see the Cancel Deletion option, click that.

Please note that the overall process will take up to 90 days. After no one can get into your account and it will be deleted from the Facebook database.

Moreover, there are types of information that Facebook may keep even after the deletion is complete. That info includes harm prevention efforts, terms violations, legal issues, and relative info, learn more about Facebook’s data policy.

What happens when you permanently delete a Facebook account?

The following things will happen whenever you press the Delete My Account button on Facebook.

• You and nobody can reactivate or get access to your FB account
• Your pictures, videos, likes, reactions, and almost everything you have shared, uploaded, and tagged in will be deleted
• You can no longer have access to Facebook Messenger you were using this account through
• You won’t be able to use your Facebook account in other places such as logging in to web apps and blogs and email accounts etc.
• Deleting a Facebook doesn’t help you remove messages you have sent to others. Those messages will be available until that person deletes them.
• Note that sent messages from your account are not stored in your account but in the account, you have sent them to.

Lots of people think that deleting their profile can help them remove their messages from the other account they have sent to. well, it is not true. This won’t help you at all, Yeh your name should be deleted from those chats and will display as a “Facebook user”.

How to Deactivate a Facebook Account

I love the deactivation tool on Facebook, which means I can temporarily disable the account and get disappeared. People can take a break and choose to come back and get connected with their friends whenever they want. I always suggest people not delete their account but deactivate it if they wanna take a break from Facebook. Anyways the choice is totally yours. Deactivate a Facebook account:

1. Login to your Facebook account.
2. Now click your profile picture at the top right.
3. Then click Settings & Privacy then Settings.
4. Click Accounts Center > Personal Details on the left side menu.
5. Now click Ownership and Control.
6. Select Deactivate account, and click Continue to account deactivation.
7. Enter your password to confirm, and follow the instruction you are looking at.

Now let’s suppose it’s been days and months and I wanna get into my Facebook account. How do I reactivate my deactivated Facebook account? Well, it’s simpler than you think, please follow me.

Reactivate a deactivated Facebook account:

You can simply reactivate your Facebook account using these sets: Go to Facebook. Login to your Account. You may see a Welcome back message from Facebook. That’s it, you have successfully reactivated a deactivated FB account.

You may start using Facebook the way you like. Chat with your friends, share and engage with public and friends’ posts, videos and photos, etc, Enjoy Facebook. If this post helps you somehow, please share it on Facebook to support us and help others.