Google is a force to be reckoned with, dominating all major areas of the Internet. This is why, most of the people have a Google Account to take full advantage of the Google Services. You can also have more than just one Google account, which may also make you consider deleting one of the Google accounts.
Well, if you are looking to delete your Google account or just gmail account, then you can easily do it right from your account (at least easier than deleting Facebook account).
In this tutorial, we are first going to show you how to backup all your Google account’s data and then, delete it permanently.
Backup All Your Data
It is extremely important that you first create a backup of all your important data before deleting your account permanently. You never know when you may need important data and if you create a backup now, you may not have to regret later.
To create a backup of all your data, Sign in to Gmail account (or any other Google service account) with the Google account which you wish to delete.
Now, click on the Account icon (with your picture) and from the tiny window that pops up, click on “Account”.
This will open up your “Account Settings”, scroll down and click on “Download data” located under the heading “Account tools”.
In there, you will see all of Google products, they all will be “Ticked (included)”, you can just click on any product to “cross (remove)” it and its data will not be backed up.
When you are done, scroll down and click on “Next” at the bottom.
On the next page, you can change “File Type” and “Delivery method” and when you are done, click on “Create archive”.
Your archive will start creating, it may take an hour up to days depending on how much data you have (for an average user it should be less than an hour for all of the accounts). Your data will be emailed to you and you can save either in your PC or drive (depending on delivery method).
Delete Gmail Account
If you only wish to delete Gmail account, not all the Google Accounts, then Sign in to “Gmail” with the account which you would like to delete.
Click on your account icon (your picture), from the pop up click on “Account”.
Now, scroll down to the end and you will see different options to delete specific Google services under the heading “Account management”. To delete Gmail, you will have to click on “Delete products”.
On the next page, click on “Remove Gmail permanently” located under the heading “Delete a Product”.
Read everything carefully on the next page, and after that check the checkbox below, confirming you are ready to delete account permanently. There will be two fields below, In the first field, enter an external email address. An external email address is the address of another email service provider besides Gmail. Here you will have to provide your email address from another email service, such as Outlook or Yahoo. Your another Gmail address will not work here, you need to either create a new email with another email service or use already in use address.
In the below field, you will have to enter a password. Enter the password of your current Gmail account that you are about to delete, not the password of your external account that you provided in the above field. Click on “REMOVE GMAIL” and you will be sent a removal confirmation message on your external email address.
Access your external email address and you should have an email from Google in your Inbox. Open it, and click on the link inside it to delete your account permanently. It will take some days to delete your account permanently.
To access other Google services, you will have to enter the external email address.
Delete Google Account
If you would like to delete your Google account along with all Google services, then sign into Gmail (or any other Google service) with the account which you would like to delete.
Click on your Account icon (your picture) and from the pop up menu click on “Account”.
Scroll to the end and click on “Delete Google Account and data” located under the heading “Account management”.
You will be prompted to enter your password again, enter and click on “Sign in”.
Read everything carefully on the next page and scroll down to the end. At the end, check the two checkboxes below, confirming you want to delete all of the data and you are responsible for any pending financial transactions. Now, click on “DELETE ACCOUNT” and your account will be deleted along with all the data on Google Services.
You will still have some time to bring back your account. If you change your mind, click the link on the next page to try to recover account, you may be prompted to use your phone to recover the account.
If there are any questions or you would like to add more information, let us know in the comments below.