Read this article to learn how to deactivate or remove your Facebook account, or a company page connected to such account and save all data in advance to any device you prefer.
The difference between deactivating and deleting a Facebook account
In Facebook, you can choose to either deactivate an account temporarily or delete it entirely. Here’s the main difference. When deactivated, the account doesn’t work anymore and other users can’t see your Facebook account. However, deactivation doesn’t remove any data or published posts, and lets you use Facebook Messenger to chat with your friends. Later, you can activate your account at any time, if necessary.
On the contrary, you can activate an account again once it has been deleted. All of its contents will be removed without any chances for recovery, and you won’t be able to sign in to other web resources that use the Log in with Facebook option (such as Spotify and Pinterest). Also, removing a Facebook account will make you lose access to Facebook Messenger and all your chats there.
So if all you need is to stop using Facebook for some time but retain the functionality of Facebook Messenger, you should go for deactivation. After all, if you don’t feel like using this social network any longer, the Facebook can be deleted forever.
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Deactivating a Facebook account
The procedure for deactivation of an account in Facebook is easy and only takes a few simple steps.
Step 1. Use a browser to go to Facebook website and log in to your account using the registration data you specified when this account was created.
Step 2. In the upper right corner of the page, click the triangular button to open the nested menu, and select the line Settings.
Step 3. In the settings page, look at the left side panel and switch to the tab Your Facebook Information. In the central panel, select from the available variants the line Deactivation and Deletion by clicking on the line or on the text link View.
Step 4. In the new page, find the option Deactivate account. Deactivating your account can be temporary, and click Continue to Account Deactivation.
Step 5. To make sure the account can’t be deactivated by accident or deliberately by third parties, Facebook will ask you to enter the current password to your account again, and click Continue to confirm your choice.
Step 6. At this stage of deactivation, check the boxes for required settings (for example, next to Keep Using Messenger, if you want to chat with friends in this app), and then click Deactivate to accomplish the process of blocking your account and removing your name and photo from most materials you shared on Facebook.
One again, you will be asked if your decision is final.
When you need to activate your account again, just repeat this procedure step by step and make your account active again, with full access to all data and functions.
How to remove a Facebook account entirely but still keep your data?
Before you actually start removing a Facebook account, you need to follow the procedure that allows you to keep the data that might be important to you, at your choice. This is how it looks like.
Step 1. Use any browser to go to Facebook and log in to your account using the corresponding button. Step 2. Repeat the necessary steps to access the account settings page by clicking on the triangular button in the upper right corner of the Facebook page and choosing a corresponding line.
Step 3. In the left side panel switch to the tab Your Facebook Information to access the available options to work with data. In the central panel, choose Download Your Information by clicking on the text link View or just clicking on the corresponding line.
Step 4. In the download page, you will see quite a long list of all categories where you might have done certain actions in Facebook and where there is some data available for saving. This list includes all data uploaded to Facebook servers, such messaging in Facebook Messenger, added photos and videos, all posts and comments, contacts, friends and followers, payment history and other information related directly to this account, including complete account information. In this page, select the stuff you need to save – for example, if you are only interested in Photos and Videos, uncheck the boxes for other categories. Otherwise, use the link Select all if you need to save all data of this account.
Now click on the Create file button located over the list of data. Facebook will initiate collection of data and prepare it for download as a archive file. Depending on the amount of your data, it may take from a few minutes to several hours. You can even close Facebook while user data is being prepared. As soon as it’s ready for download, Facebook will send you a notification that will show up in the corresponding panel.
Step 5. In the page Download Your Information find the tab Available copies containing the file prepared by Facebook and save it by clicking on the Download button.
For security purposes, Facebook will ask you to enter the password again to confirm that this account is yours.
Now unzip the archive, and open it to make sure that it contains the data you requested. For example, the file format for download was selected as HTML. As long as the chosen category is Photo and video, the archive contains only one generalizing HTML file and a folder with the downloaded photos and videos.
Now that all data important to the user has been saved you can proceed with removing the Facebook account. This is how you do it.
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