LinkedIn isn’t the only social network out there that you can use to advance your career, so if you’ve decided you no longer have any use for your account, here’s how you can shut it down.
How to Deactivate Your Account
Technically, LinkedIn does not allow users to deactivate or disable their accounts. Instead, what you can do is hide your account from search engine results and will not be visible to users who are not logged in to their LinkedIn accounts. To do this go to Privacy and Settings > Manage > Edit your public profile > and check Make my profile visible to no one.
This is, however, a little misleading. As LinkedIn notes, it may be several weeks before your profile stops showing up in search engine results. But you can still log in to your LinkedIn account and use the site’s services, and your profile will still be visible to your existing connections.
How to Delete Your Account
To completely delete your LinkedIn account go to the Close Account page, which you can also access by going to Privacy and Settings > Manage > Account > Closing Your Account and click Change. You will be prompted to enter a reason for closing your account, will enter your password, and you’re done.
If you close your account, you will lose all of your connections, endorsements, recommendations, and of course your profile information. If you change your mind, you have 20 days to reopen your account before it is irrevocably lost.
You can also download a copy of your information from LinkedIn before shutting your account down if you choose. This will involve requesting your data from LinkedIn. It should take about 24 hours for LinkedIn to respond to your request.
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