How to close your Microsoft account

Spend any remaining money in your Microsoft account by buying digital content from Microsoft Store. 

To see how much money is in your Microsoft account, sign in to the Microsoft account website. You should also check your Skype account balance to make sure you don't have unused credits—after deleting an account, you can't get those credits back.

For more info, read about the limits on the money in your Microsoft account.

If you have subscriptions to services like Microsoft 365, OneDrive, Xbox Live Gold, or an ad-free Outlook.com account, you won’t be able to access them anymore.

To cancel most Microsoft subscriptions:

1. Sign in to Services & subscriptions on the Microsoft account website.

2. For each paid subscription, go to the subscription you want to cancel and select Payment & billing which appears under the name of the subscription you want to cancel. Select Cancel and follow the remaining instructions.

For any subscription not listed there, go to the service itself (or to the retailer, if you bought the subscription from a retailer) to cancel. For example, if you have a Skype subscription, go to the Skype support page and search for cancellation info.

For more info about cancelling a subscription, see Cancel or turn off recurring billing for a Microsoft subscription.

If the email address associated with your Microsoft account ends in @outlook.com, @hotmail.com, @live.com, or @msn.com, closing the Microsoft account deletes any email stored with it after the 60-day waiting period. During the waiting period, however, your inbox will continue to receive email messages. If the email associated with your Microsoft account is from a different provider like @gmail.com, you can skip this section because your email address won't be affected. 

You can set up an automatic reply to let everyone know that the account is going to be closed, and tell them where to send email to you in the future.

1. Sign in to your Outlook.com inbox. Select the Options icon, and then select Options.

2. Under Managing your account, select Sending automated vacation replies and then follow the instructions.

You can also choose Email forwarding under Managing your account to have email you receive sent to a different email address. However, both automatic replies and email forwarding will stop working when your Microsoft account is closed permanently after the 60-day waiting period.

If you've used a Microsoft service to store any file or info associated with your closed account, you won't be able to access it. If there's anything you want to keep, you must save a copy. For example:

• Email, documents, and photos you've stored in Outlook.com, Hotmail, or OneDrive.

• Personal data you've stored on HealthVault.

• Purchasing info at Microsoft.com.

• Portfolio data on MSN Money.

• Messenger contacts added to Skype. For more info about backing up your contact list, search the Skype support page.

• Product keys for any products you've purchased with this Microsoft account. (Your installed software will continue to work, but you'll need the product key if you ever want to reinstall the software, or install it on a new device.)

There is some data you can't save when you close your Microsoft account. You'll no longer be able to access music you've downloaded using an Xbox Music Pass. (Music and videos you've purchased outright will still be playable but can't be transferred to another device.) Your game progress, Gamerscore, and Gamertag on Xbox Live will be lost.

Devices like Windows phones, computers running Windows 8.1 or later, Surface tablets, and Xbox consoles all work best with a Microsoft account. Some of these devices will still work—to a degree—but you won’t be able to use all their apps and features. Before you close your account, consider setting these devices up with a different Microsoft account so that you can still sign in.

If you manage a child's Microsoft account, their account stays open when yours is closed. However, after your Microsoft account is closed, your child will be stopped when they try to sign in to Xbox, computers running Windows 8 or later, or Windows phones, until they get consent from another parent account.

If you've purchased Online Commercial Support using this Microsoft account, you must use any remaining benefits or they'll be lost. There are two types of support benefit packages available:

• Single incident support. Go to My Support Requests and look at your case history.

  • If your case is closed, you can close your Microsoft account.

  • If your case is still open, you should wait until it's closed before you close your account. If you close your account too soon, you won't be able to get any potential refunds.

• Five-pack incident support. Go to My Professional Support 5-packs and look at your case history.

  • If you've used all the cases, or it the package expired, you can close your Microsoft account.

  • If you're eligible for a refund, you must request it before you close your Microsoft account.

  • If you have any remaining or open cases, you should use the rest of your package before you close your Microsoft account. If you don't use the package before you close the account, you'll lose any unused cases and you won't be able to get a refund.

If you're a developer and you want to retain control of any packages you own on NuGet.org, be sure to first transfer the ownership of these packages to a different account before deleting the existing account. For more information about how to do this, see How to delete my NuGet.org account.