You may be wondering how to delete your Facebook account now that fact-checking is no longer considered important, and Meta’s changing its definition of what constitutes Hateful Conduct. It’s easy to do, and we’ll show you how. But you should download all your stuff first.

The following instructions are for the web version of Facebook, but you can follow pretty much the same sequence on the mobile app.

Download your archives

Your Facebook archives contain just about all of the pertinent information related to your account, including your photos, active sessions, chat history, IP addresses, facial recognition data, and which ads you clicked. That’s personal information you should save.

• Click on your personal icon in the upper-right corner.
• Go to Settings & Privacy > Settings.
• Click on the Accounts Center box on the left.

• Go to Your information and permissions on the left, and then Download Your Information > Download or transfer information.
• You can choose to transfer information from your Facebook or Instagram account (or both).
• You now have another choice. You can select Available information, which includes everything but data logs. (Meta defines these as “additional details we collect and store that can be associated with you.”) Or you can select Specific types of information, which allows you to determine exactly what you want to download, including those data logs.
• If you choose the latter, you can then select from the variety of data you’ve accumulated, including posts, friends, logged information, saved items and collections, etc. (You can also get the data logs, although Facebook warns it could take 15 days for them to show.) Click on Select all — but be aware you have to click it for each category. When you’re ready, select Next.

• Choose Download to device or Transfer to destination. According to Meta, the typical download is about 2.5GB.
• You’ll now be able to select the date range of the info you want to download (or you can simply download all of it), the format (usually HTML or JSON), and the media quality (low, medium, or high). Enter an email address for a notification when the download is ready.
• Finally, select Create files. You’ll receive an email when your file is ready, and it will be available for a few days. If you’ve been waiting a while and want to know the status of your download (or want to cancel it), go back to the Download your information tab.

Delete your account

You’re ready to delete your account once you’ve finished downloading your archive.

• When you are ready, go back to the Accounts Center and click on Personal Details > Account ownership and control > Deactivation or deletion.
• Click Deactivation and Deletion.
• If you have both Facebook and Instagram accounts, you will be asked to choose one.

• If you only want to deactivate your account temporarily (maybe you hope CEO Mark Zuckerberg will change his mind?), you can choose to do so. Otherwise, select Delete account and click Continue.
• You’ll be informed of any other accounts you have with Meta and given several options to explain why you’re leaving. Just keep hitting Continue.

• You’ll see an option to deactivate your account instead or save the posts in your archive, download your info, and review the apps you’re logged into. When you’re ready, hit Continue.
• You’ll be asked for your password for confirmation. Enter it.
• Finally ready? Hit Delete account.
• Once you click Delete account, your account will be marked for termination and inaccessible to others using Facebook.

Meta notes that it delays termination for a few days after the request has gone through. The deletion will be canceled if you log back in during that period. So don’t sign on, or you’ll be forced to start the process over again.

Certain things, like comments you’ve made on a friend’s post, may still appear even after you delete your account. Facebook also says that copies of certain items like log records will remain in its database, but it notes that those are disassociated with personal identifiers.

If you’re really serious about quitting anything associated with Meta, remember that the company owns several other popular services as well, like Instagram, WhatsApp, and Threads, so you should delete your accounts there, too.

Update January 9th, 2025: This article was originally published on September 28th, 2018, and has been updated several times to allow for changes in the Facebook interface.

One Echo is good, but several Echos are better. Amazon’s Echo devices have multiroom audio support, which allows users to simultaneously stream music over multiple speakers, making it feasible for people to outfit their entire homes with Amazon’s smart speaker.

The feature lets you play audio from Amazon Music, TuneIn, iHeartRadio, Pandora, Spotify, and Sirius XM over multiple speakers. It even added Apple Music support last December. (Note: multiroom audio support only works if you’re listening to a single music stream over multiple speakers. If you want to listen to more than one stream over different speakers at the same time, you’ll have to use the Amazon Unlimited Family Plan.)

To set up multiroom audio, open the Alexa app and select “Devices” from the bottom right corner. Tap the + icon in the top right, and select “Set Up Multi-Room Music.” The app will then prompt you to create a group, making it easier to control music playback by saying things like “Alexa, play music upstairs” instead of calling out individual speakers. Once you’ve created your group(s), add your desired devices, and the setup is complete.

Using multiroom audio is as simple as everything else with the Echo — just say where you want the music to play. Saying “Play Justin Timberlake” followed by the name of your group will activate the music in your desired location, and so far, it’s worked flawlessly in my testing.

If you’re like me and you enjoy the ease of use that multiroom audio support provides but you would like to utilize it with better speakers — like Sonos, for example — you can do that as well. First, you have to use your Alexa app to add the Sonos Skill and to discover your Sonos devices. You should also add the music services that you are using with your Sonos system. (Any music services you want to use need to be on both the Alexa and Sonos apps.) You can then control your Sonos devices using Alexa and create groups of Sonos products within your Alexa app. (You can also associate Alexa with a single Sonos speaker and use your Sonos app to create a group associated with that speaker.)

Sonos may not be the only company rolling out an integration with Amazon. Amazon has released an API to allow third-party Alexa speakers to operate within the multiroom audio playback setup. At this rate, soon, Alexa will be the main operator of all the music in your home, and I don’t think that’s a bad thing.

Multiroom audio playback is available to Echo owners in the US, UK, and Germany on Echo, Echo Dot, and Echo Show devices.

Update January 15th, 2020, 11:37PM ET: This article has been updated to include current screenshots and link names and to clarify information about the Unlimited Family Plan.

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AT&T is inviting DirecTV Now users to sign up for a chance to test its upcoming streaming set-top box. The company sent an email to select DirecTV Now subscribers this morning, asking them to sign up to test the device for “about six months.” AT&T Communications CEO John Donovan announced that the device was in beta last month and said the company was planning to begin trials in early 2019.

According to AT&T, the device will automatically launch DirecTV Now when turned on, users will be able to download content from the Google Play Store, and it will come with Google Assistant support so users can control the device with their voice. According to leaked FCC filings reported by Variety last year, the device will run Android TV, support third-party streaming services, and come with a voice search remote.

With AT&T’s streaming box about to hit the public (albeit, in a limited fashion), we should get more details about the device in the near future.

Sonos is delaying support for Google Assistant until 2019, the company announced in a blog post today. Back in October 2017, Sonos announced that Google Assistant would come to its Sonos One speaker in 2018, following its support for Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant. But over the past year, that integration hasn’t materialized.

“While we originally planned to have the experience ready to ship in 2018, the reality is that we need a bit more time to get the experience right and will now look to lock down a date in 2019, and we’re continuing to make good progress,” Sonos wrote in the blog post. In August, Sonos CEO Patrick Spence told The Verge that the company was pushing to have Google Assistant support ready before the end of 2018, but that timeline has clearly slipped.

Sonos now says it will provide an update for the release of Google Assistant “in early 2019.” Sonos owners can sign up here to be considered for a private beta that will test out Google’s voice assistant on the platform.

If you’re the account owner on a Spotify Premium Family plan in the US, you can get a free Google Home Mini from the streaming service through the end of the year beginning on November 1st, Spotify announced today. Spotify has partnered with Google to give out the voice assistant to account owners on its family plan who sign up through the link here on November 1st. 

On the surface, it may seem like a nice holiday giveaway for Family plan users (and it is in some respects). But with the growth of Amazon Music largely on the back of the Echo and the rise of smart speakers, which may be in 50 percent of US homes before the end of the year, it’s also a strategic move for Spotify. YouTube Music and Google Play Music are still far from serious competition for Spotify, but Amazon’s rapid growth in the music sector combined with the success of the Google Home makes this an easy and quick way to get people listening to Spotify on smart speakers before they get hooked by Amazon’s easy-to-use ecosystem.

(For Spotify, it’s better your kids take that Google Home to college than pick up an Echo and an Amazon Music account. Amazon has been making inroads in every part of the home, from your alarm clock to your microwave. For kids who grow up with Alexa, it’s only logical to use the music service that works best with it.)

According to a report from the market research firm MusicWatch, music listeners who pay for services like Spotify, Amazon, and Apple Music are 240 percent more likely to use a smart speaker or personal assistant device than those who don’t pay for music. With Spotify already partnering with Samsung for its devices including the Galaxy Home and now pushing the Google Home Mini, it’s clear Spotify wants to lock in the casual listener who may be in a Premium user’s house, but not committed to a streaming service yet.

Spotify says the free Google Home Mini is a limited offer, so if you want one sign up tomorrow.

Update October 31st, 9:00AM ET: Spotify says the sign up period will begin on November 1st, not October 31st. The post has been updated to reflect this.