If you are among the many looking to leave Twitter after Elon Musk’s takeover or for any other reason, then you are in the right spot. Below is an easy step-by-step guide on how to delete/ deactivate your Twitter account. This will put your account to rest and no one will be able to view your profile, tweets, or tag you going forward. That said, Twitter holds on to users’ data for at least 30 days after the deactivation request in case the user decides to rejoin the microblogging and social networking service. Twitter also allows users to backup their data before deleting/ deactivating the account. Here are all the details:
Table of Contents
How to delete Twitter account on mobile phone
To delete your Twitter account, you have to first “deactivate” it. As soon as you deactivate your account, Twitter will immediately take your public profile offline, meaning none of your Tweets will be publically accessible by anyone. After you deactivate the account, Twitter will place your account in the queue to permanently delete it.
Keep in mind that you don’t need to delete your Twitter account if you just want to delete your Tweets or want to change your username. Twitter offers ways to do both of them without needing to delete your Twitter account.
On Android mobile phone
It’s very easy to delete a Twitter account on your Android device. Here’s how you can do it.
- Open the Twitter app or download it from the Play Store.
- Click on your profile picture in the top-right corner
- Now tap on Settings and Privacy.
- Click on Your Account.
- Press Deactivate Account.
- You’ll be presented with a Deactivate your account screen.
![]()
- Click Deactivate button.
- On the next screen, enter your password and click Deactivate to deactivate your account.
On iPhone
The steps to delete a Twitter account on iPhone are the same as on Android. You click on your profile icon at the top-right corner –> Go to Settings and Privacy –> Click on Your Account –> Press Deactivate Account –> Confirm your password and tap Deactivate.
How to delete Twitter account on desktop
The steps to delete a Twitter account on a desktop follow the same easy steps. Here’s how you can delete your Twitter account on your desktop/laptop.
- Open the Twitter website.
- Click on the More button on the left of the screen.
- Now click on Settings and Privacy.
- Tap on Your account on the next screen.
- Click Deactivate your account button at the bottom, enter your Twitter password, and then click on the Deactivate button to deactivate your Twitter account.
![]()
Twitter sometimes asks you to confirm your account password while following this process to make sure you’re the actual owner of the Twitter account. If you’re asked to confirm your account password anywhere while following the steps, do enter it.
FAQs
How to backup tweets before deactivating Twitter account
So you have finally decided to delete your Twitter account for good. But what if you don’t want to lose access to the precious tweets that you made over time while you were still on Twitter? Fret not, Twitter makes it easy to get a backup of your Tweets. Here’s how you can take an archive of your Twitter data.
- Log in to your Twitter account –> click on the More button on the left of the screen –> Now tap Settings and Privacy — > Click Your account — > then tap on Download an archive of your data.
- Twitter will ask you to send a code to your registered E-mail address, click Send. Enter the code received in the E-mail and tap on the Next button at the bottom. After you click on the Next button, you’ll be taken to Twitter’s data archiving page. Click the Request archive button to request the backup archive file. It’ll take 24 hours for your data archive to get ready. Twitter will send you a notification on your E-mail once you can download the archive.
If you have the app installed on either Android or iPhone. Go to Settings and privacy menu –> click Your account –> click on Download an archive of your data –> Enter the password if asked –> click Download data in the download data section. A .zip file will be downloaded containing all your Twitter data. Twitter also provides the data archive file in the machine-readable HTML and JSON files form.
The data archive contains everything from your first Tweets to Direct Messages, Twitter followers and the following list, your media (GIFs, images, videos, and more), your created lists, interests, and demographic information that you provided to Twitter, and more.
How to unlink third-party apps from your account
Before you deactivate your Twitter account, you may want to revoke access to third-party apps on your Twitter account, so that they no longer have continued access to the data that your Twitter account holds. Keep in mind that the data, to which the third-party apps already have access, cannot be deleted. You need to contact individual third-party developers to delete the data from their apps. These may be third-party Twitter clients, games, apps, and various services that you have previously granted your Twitter access to.
Here’s how you revoke/unlink the third-party app access to your Twitter account:
Log in to your Twitter account –> go to Settings and privacy –> click on Security and account access –> tap on Apps and sessions –> press on Connected apps. After you click on the connected apps button, you’ll get the app and services list to that you have granted Twitter access. Click on the individual apps and services and click Revoke app permissions. As soon as you click on the Revoke app permissions button at the bottom of the screen, the said app will be disconnected, and it’ll no longer have access to your Twitter data.
How to restore your Twitter account
To restore your deactivated Twitter account just log back into your account within the 30-day deactivation timeframe. Don’t be late, otherwise, after 30 days your account will be permanently deleted by Twitter and you’ll no longer be able to restore your Twitter account.
