How To Delete Gmail Account

Sometimes people have an old email address or too many email addresses and they want to know how to delete a Gmail account. This situation typically occurs when an individual has an email account from when they were young, and the address is vulgar or too inappropriate for communication with businesses or universities. Some people may want to delete their Gmail account because it has accumulated too much spam mail. If you are in any of these situations or simply don't want your Gmail account anymore, here is how to delete a Gmail account.

1. Go to the Gmail website and type in your login information. You will need both your username and password. You cannot delete your account unless you are signed into your Gmail account. If you no longer know your password, you can retrieve it by clicking on the "Can't access your account?" link. This will take you through a series of steps to retrieve your password.
2. Once you are logged in, you will see your full email address in the upper right-hand corner. It will be in this format: yourusername@gmail.com. To the right of that, there is a button that says "Settings." Click on this button.
3. On the Settings page, there will be several tabs across the top of the page that you can click on. Find "Accounts and Import" and click on it. It will be the third tab over. It will bring you to a list of tasks you can do, such as changing account settings, importing contacts, and linking Gmail accounts together. Under "Change Account Settings," click on "Other Google Account Settings." It is the last of the three options under this section.
4. Once you click on "Other Google Account Settings," a new window will open that will display your Google Accounts page. It will show you all of the Google products you have on the web. Towards the middle of the page, you will see "My Products." Directly next to this, click on "edit." You will then be given two options.
5. One option you are presented with is to delete your Gmail account permanently. The other option is to delete all Google accounts associated with your user name. Choose whichever option best suits you needs. Depending on which option you choose, either your Gmail account will be deleted or all of your Google accounts will be deleted.

Your deleted e-mail messages may take up to sixty days to be completely eliminated from all systems, including Gmail backup systems. If you would like to retrieve your e-mail address after you delete it, you must contact Gmail as soon as possible. After a couple weeks, you may not be able to ever retrieve it again. If your e-mail address is retrieved, you will not be able to access any previous e-mail messages. These are not retrievable.