How to delete Twitter and remove all your data, likes and Tweets

Deleting the Twitter app doesn't close your account. Here's how to delete your Twitter account proper.

The news that Elon Musk intends to buy Twitter and let all the bad people back on has caused a mass migration from the service, with many people searching for how to delete Twitter. Which is no surprise, really.

Whatever your reasons for wanting to delete Twitter, however, here's how nuke Twitter from orbit and salt the earth. Or less dramatically, how to delete and deactivate your Twitter account permanently.

How to delete Twitter: Step by step guide

Twitter settings

(Image credit: Future)

The best way to delete your Twitter account is to log in at Twitter.com and then click on the three-dot More icon in the left hand sidebar. 

You should now see a link down towards the bottom that says Settings and Privacy. I've highlighted it in the screenshot above for your convenience.

From there you should see a panel heading called Settings, with one to the right saying Your Account. Click into that.

The option you want is the last one featured, which is Deactivate Your Account. Screenshot below.

Twitter your account

(Image credit: Future)

Should I delete Twitter? What you need to know

There are some things you need to know before you do this, though, and they're important. 

1. You can change your mind within 30 days, after which your profile, account and tweets are gone. 

2. Deactivating will remove your tweets from Twitter, but they may still appear in search results and in other people's screenshots. 

3. When your account is gone so is your username, which means another user may pick it up and use it. If you have a fairly high-profile account it might be better to prevent that from happening by keeping your account live and just not posting any more.

Carrie Marshall

Writer, musician and broadcaster Carrie Marshall has been covering technology since 1998 and is particularly interested in how tech can help us live our best lives. Her CV is a who’s who of magazines, newspapers, websites and radio programmes ranging from T3, Techradar and MacFormat to the BBC, Sunday Post and People’s Friend. Carrie has written more than a dozen books, ghost-wrote two more and co-wrote seven more books and a Radio 2 documentary series. When she’s not scribbling, she’s the singer in Glaswegian rock band HAVR (havrmusic.com).