How to Delete Old Instagram without the Password 2021

If you have finally decided to clear up your social media for whatever reason best known to you, there might be a necessity to delete your old Instagram.

It might just be that you do not feel comfortable sharing as much information as you had previously shared on that account.

Or maybe you do not even really use your account, so you just want to delete it and move on. Or maybe you want to start afresh right from the start, or even for a completely different reason.

Whatever the reason does not matter really, sometimes it just feels good to be able to get rid of everything completely and just start over from scratch.

Instagram is actually one of the top five major social media networks that are really liberal and allows users to manage their accounts anyhow they deem fit.

Obviously, this would also have a limit, but then a whole lot of features and functions are left to the will of the user. Right from your Instagram account, sign up down to you making a post or commenting on other people’s posts; you have the right to al that when you use Instagram.

However, there are a couple of features that are not that popular with users, so they do not even know they have the right to such functions while using the app.

A very good example is the right to delete your Instagram without using any password. Instagram already had the foresight that there was a possibility of their users losing their passwords, which allowed measures for account recovery to be put in place.

Normally if you want to delete your Instagram account, you would need to be logged in first. So you can easily realize how losing your password could pose a huge problem.

But before you take any drastic action, I would advise that you try all your old passwords to see if any of them would work and enable you to log in.

This section lists out the items you would need to successfully log in to your Instagram in order to delete your account:

• Username
• Password
• Email address
• Mobile phone number
• Active data
• A Smartphone or PC.

These are the things you would need to login into your account and then delete it, and mind you, and you would not be able to delete your account when you cannot log in to it.

So now, I bet you are wondering if you have forgotten my Instagram password, how can I recover the account. Well, there are two basic ways to go about recovering your account.

• You could recover it using the Instagram app.
• Or you could recover it using the Instagram website.

Using the Instagram App to Recover Your Account

How to Delete Old Instagram without the Password

This process is quite straightforward, irrespective of the device you are using to load the Instagram app. But for the sake of clarity, I would explain how this process would work on both android and IOS devices.

• Using an android device

1. First, you would have to open the Instagram app and make sure you are on the sign-in page.
2. Then you click on the “get help signing in” link that you would see below the sign-in fields.
3. When you were creating your account, you must have used a phone number, email, or username to type any of those details in and then click “next.” Just ensure you use details that are actually connected to your account because you would need access to those details to complete your recovery process.
4. If you typed a phone number, then that means Instagram will send a message to you containing the new code you can type into the app.
5. Click Next, and then you can change your old password to a new one by entering it twice in the given fields and clicking on reset password.
6. Once you have reset your password, you can easily log into your account.
7. If you typed in an email, a confirmation link in the form of an email message would be sent to that email address.
8. Go to your mail and check for the message, but you may have to check your spam, update, or social folder if you do not find it.
9. Once you open the message, click on the password reset link.
10. You would be brought to a page where you can enter your new password twice in the given field.
11. Click on reset password and then log in to your account.
12. If you typed in your username, you would be asked to select a preferred method of getting your confirmation code, either by email or SMS.
13. The next step would be based on your choice, as explained above.

• Using an IOS device

1. To begin, you would first open the Instagram app.
2. Make sure you are on the sign-in page.
3. Then click on the “get help signing in” link that you would be below the sign-in fields.
4. You can use a phone number, email, or username, so you have to type any of those details in and then click “next.” Just ensure you use details that are actually connected to your account because you would need access to those details to complete your recovery process.
5. If you typed in your username, you would be asked to select a preferred method of getting your confirmation code, either by email or SMS.
6. If you typed in an email, a confirmation link in the form of an email message would be sent to that email address.
7. Go to your mail and check for the message, but you may have to check your spam, update, or social folder if you do not find it.
8. Once you open the message, click on the password reset link.
9. You would be brought to a page where you can enter your new password twice in a given field.
10. Click on reset password and then log in to your account.
11. If you typed a phone number, then that means Instagram will send a message to you containing the new code you can type into the app.
12. Click Next, and then you can change your old password to a new one by entering it twice in the given fields and clicking on reset password.
13. Once you have reset your password, you can easily log into your account.

Using Instagram Website to Recover Your Account

If you do not have access to the Instagram app for whatever reason, you can still recover your account by going through the website.

1. First, you would have to type this web address “https:// www.instagram.com” into your browser in order to get to the Instagram website.
2. You would be brought to the Instagram login page.
3. Click “forgot password” below the login field at the bottom of the page.
4. Then type in the phone number, email address, or username associated with your account. Ensure you can easily access any detail you decide to give out because you would need it later on.
5. Click the “send login link” button to send a confirmation link to any of the details you have provided.
6. If you get a code as an SMS, then enter the code into the Instagram field that would be provided.
7. And if you get an email instead, click on the reset password link that would be present in the message.
8. Either way, you would see a page where you can type your new password twice to reset your password.

Once you have done this, you would be able to log in to your account comfortably and delete your account if you want to. But the thing is, deleting your account is a very permanent action. So, before we go over deleting your account, I would like us to take a look at how you can deactivate your account and the differences between deactivation and deletion of an Instagram account.

The Difference between Deactivation and Deletion of an Instagram Account

There are times I have seen people use these terms interchangeably, which go to prove that they do not know they are absolutely different actions. As an Instagram user, you could decide to deactivate your account or even delete it permanently as you deem fit. The important things to note are:

• The act of deactivating your account is very temporary, but while your account is still deactivated, your whole profile, along with your followers, your pictures, likes, and comments, would remain completely hidden from other Instagram users. It would seem as though you do not exist on the app’s sphere at all. And when you are done with deactivating your account, and you wish to come back to using the app, all you really need to do is to log back into your account.
• The process of deleting your account is as permanent as permanent can get. There is no trick or hidden way to retrieve an account that has been deleted. Once you have finally decided to delete your account, you must be comfortable with the fact that all your whole profile, along with your followers, your pictures, likes, and comments, would be gone for good. In fact, if, later in the future, you decide to come back to Instagram, you would not be allowed to use that same username again, and the same goes for any other person that attempts to use the username too.

How to Deactivate an Instagram Account

There is actually no way you can deactivate an account using the Instagram app. You have to use your web browser and carry out the action on the Instagram website. If you want to stay off Instagram and just deactivate your account, you can follow these steps:

• Go on to the Instagram website.
• Then log on to your account.
• Then you can click on the icon that looks like a person.
• It would take you to your profile page.
• Then you can click on “Edit Profile.”
• You can then scroll down to the bottom of your page and then select “Temporarily disable my account.”
• You would then be asked, “Why are you disabling your account?”
• You can then choose a reason from the drop-down menu that would be made available to you.
• You should then retype your password and then choose “Temporarily disable the account.”
• Once you have done this, your account would now be immediately deactivated and would be hidden from others till you can log into your account again.

NOTE: You have to realize you can only deactivate your account just once a week, which means once you have deactivated your account, you would have to wait for seven days before such an action can take place again. This is a result of Instagram’s usage policy.

How to Activate a Deactivated Account

If you have deactivated your Instagram account, probably take a break from social media, or for whatever reason you might have, you need not worry about how you would activate your account when you are finally ready to start using it again.

I have already stated how the act of deactivating an account is temporary, but this would give you the actual steps you would need if you want to activate your already deactivated account. But you must ensure your account has been deactivated for at least a week to avoid running into any problems.

To activate it, you would have to;

• Launch your Instagram app
• Type in your username and password.
• Click on the login. As long as all your details are correct, you should be able to log in and reactivate your account.
• You may have to follow some on-screen instructions before you are fully functional.

You must realize you cannot reactivate a deleted account, though. So, before you delete any account, you must be absolutely sure that it is what you want.

If you have issues reactivating your account because you have forgotten your password, you can follow the steps in this article as a guide.

If, after reading the above steps and you decide that it is still the path of deleting your account you wish to follow, then it would be highly advisable you consider downloading your Instagram data.

This is because when it comes to deletion, it is not reversible, and nothing can be done to save an already deleted account.

But to save guard your nice pictures and videos, it is highly encouraged that you download your data before you delete your account.

How to Download your Instagram Account’s Data

The importance of downloading your Instagram data can never be overemphasized. This is because the moment you delete your Instagram account, all your data would be erased forever.

It is one thing to delete your Instagram, and it is a completely different thing to lose years of content that you have created just because you want to delete your account. If you want to download a copy of your Instagram account’s data, then you have to;

• Open your Instagram profile.
• Then you have to go to Settings.
• Then select the “Privacy and Security” tab and then select “Request Download.”
• Type in the email address where you would love to receive your link to your Instagram data, which your password would then follow.
• In the next forty-eight hours, you should be able to receive an email with a link to your data that would be titled “Your Instagram Data.”
• You can then click on “Download data.”

The moment you have followed all these steps correctly, you would be able to download your Instagram data perfectly. Then you can move on to the next big step, which is deleting your account.

How to Delete Your Instagram Account

Just like when I explained the process of deactivating an Instagram account, there is no way to delete an Instagram account using the application.

The only way you can do this is if you use your web browser to go to the Instagram website itself. While you are going through this process, you must be very careful and keep in mind that everything you do at this stage is permanent.

So you have to be very sure and certain about what you decide to do.

If you want to delete your Instagram account, you would have to:

• Log into your account through the Instagram website.
• Then go to Instagram’s “Delete your account” page.
• You can then choose from the drop-down menu that would be provided for you a reason that best fits why you want to delete your account.
• Type in your password and then click “Permanently delete my account.”

Once you have followed all the above steps, your Instagram account would be completely deleted.

Can a hacker delete my account without knowing my password using the steps in this article?

The most important thing you must realize is that you must always be extremely cautious about the emails you get from Instagram:

You have to realize your mail is the first point of call through which Instagram can alert you if anything suspicious happens to be going on in your account.

If there has been an attempt to change your password or any weird activity like that, Instagram would always notify you by mail first.

There would be a link that would be sent to your mail, and this link can also be used to report the activity to Instagram. The next best action would be to change your password to something completely different as soon as possible.

If a hacker also tries to change the email address connected to your account, there would also be a link that would be sent to your mail that you could use to revert such action.

You just have to be careful and be sure those emails you get as alerts are also not phishing attempts to get your Instagram account information.

There is a walk around when it comes to this, though, and you can always check through the security section to see the emails Instagram has sent you in the last 14 days, just to confirm if those notifications are legit or not.

The fact is that as long as you keep an eye on the mails, you get from Instagram, and you report strange activities when necessary, there would be absolutely no way a hacker would get into your account talking less of deleting it. So you can rest assured that your account is safe.