Google to delete inactive Gmail accounts next month, Keep your account active by doing this

Google will delete all Google Accounts including Gmail, Docs, Drive, Meet, Calendar and Google Photos that have not been used or signed into for at least 2 years in December 2023 as per it’s latest inactivity policy. The search giant will clear out the inactive Google Account along with all it’s contents in December.

However, only the personal Google Accounts will be affected. Google will not delete the accounts for organisations. Google clarified that its new policy will mostly affect the accounts that have not been used for an extended period of time.

According to the company, the reason Google is deleting the inactive Gmail and other accounts is that forgotten or unattended accounts often rely on old or re-used passwords that may have been compromised and don’t have two-factor authentication set up. They also receive fewer security checks by the user.

In a blog post, Ruth Kricheli, VP of Product Management at Google revealed that abandoned accounts are at least 10x less likely than active accounts to have 2-step-verification set up.

The company will be taking a phased approach to the deletions. The first accounts to be deleted will be those that were created and then never used again. Google will send multiple notifications over the months before the deletion. These notifications will both be sent to the unused account and more importantly, to a recovery email if it has been provided.

Google deleting inactive Gmail accounts: How to keep Gmail account active

If you don’t want your account to be deleted then keep you Google account activate by doing this. To keep a Google Account active, you need to sign in at least once every two years. This means that if you have signed into your Google Account or into any other service using the same account then Google will consider yours to be active and not delete it.