How to Stop Google from Tracking You
A step-by-step guide to turning off Google tracking, deleting your activity history, and opting out of ad personalization. No account deletion required.
See what Google has collected on you
Google stores a detailed log of your searches, YouTube watches, locations, and app activity. Start here before changing any settings.
- Go to myactivity.google.com while signed into your Google account
- This shows every search, page visit, YouTube video, and voice query Google has recorded
- Use the filter to browse by product: Search, YouTube, Maps, Assistant, Chrome
- The volume of data here is often surprising. This is what you are about to turn off
- Visit takeout.google.com to download everything Google holds on you before deleting it
- Select the products you want: Search history, YouTube history, Location History, Chrome history
- Google will email you a download link within a few hours
- Worth doing if you want a local backup of your YouTube history or saved places
Turn off Web & App Activity and Location History
These are the two main tracking settings. Turning them off stops Google from recording new activity. It does not delete what already exists.
- Go to myaccount.google.com/activitycontrols
- Click Web & App Activity and select Turn off
- Uncheck Include Chrome history and activity from sites before confirming
- This stops Google from saving your searches and the sites you visit while signed in
- Also turn off YouTube History on the same page if you want
- On the same Activity Controls page, click Location History
- Select Turn off to stop Google Maps from recording your movements
- On Android: go to Settings, Location, Google Location Accuracy and turn it off
- Location data is used to build a timeline of everywhere you have been. This stops new entries
- Your existing Timeline data remains until you delete it in the next step
Delete your existing Google history
Turning off tracking stops new data from being saved. Deleting removes what Google has already stored. Do both for full effect.
- Go to myactivity.google.com/delete-activity
- Select All time to delete everything, or choose a custom date range
- Confirm deletion. This removes Search, YouTube, Maps, and Assistant history in one step
- Deletion is permanent and cannot be undone
- Open Google Maps, tap your profile picture, then Your Timeline
- Tap the three dots, then Settings and privacy, then Delete all Location History
- Or go to timeline.google.com on desktop
- This permanently removes Google's record of everywhere you have been
- At myaccount.google.com/activitycontrols, even with tracking off you can set auto-delete
- If you later turn tracking back on, auto-delete at 3 months limits how much builds up
- Go to each activity type and click Auto-delete, then set to 3 months
Opt out of ad personalization and reduce cross-site tracking
Google uses your data to serve targeted ads across millions of websites. These settings do not stop all ads but stop them from being built on your personal profile.
- Go to myadcenter.google.com
- Toggle off My Ad Center at the top of the page
- This stops Google from using your search history, YouTube activity, and demographics to target ads
- You will still see ads, but they will not be based on your personal profile
- Go to Chrome Settings, Privacy and Security, then Third-party cookies and block them
- Turn on Send a Do Not Track request (limited effect, but worth enabling)
- Consider switching your default search engine to DuckDuckGo or Brave Search
- For stronger protection, Brave browser blocks Google trackers by default without any configuration
- The uBlock Origin extension blocks Google Analytics and ad scripts across the web
Turning off these settings does not make you invisible to Google. If you use Gmail, Google Docs, or Android, Google still processes your data to provide those services. What these steps do is stop Google from building a behavioral profile used for advertising and activity logging. Completing Sections 2 and 3 (turning off tracking and deleting existing history) removes the most significant data collection for most people. If you want stronger separation, switching your search engine and browser adds meaningful protection without requiring you to leave Google's core services entirely.