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Disabling two-factor authentication for your personal account

If you disable two-factor authentication for your personal account, you may lose access to organizations you belong to.

Note: Starting in March 2023 and through the end of 2023, GitHub will gradually begin to require all users who contribute code on GitHub.com to enable one or more forms of two-factor authentication (2FA). If you are in an eligible group, you will receive a notification email when that group is selected for enrollment, marking the beginning of a 45-day 2FA enrollment period, and you will see banners asking you to enroll in 2FA on GitHub.com. If you don't receive a notification, then you are not part of a group required to enable 2FA, though we strongly recommend it.

For more information about the 2FA enrollment rollout, see this blog post.

Warning: If you're a member, billing manager, or outside collaborator to a public repository of an organization that requires two-factor authentication and you disable 2FA, you'll be automatically removed from the organization, and you'll lose your access to their repositories. To regain access to the organization, re-enable two-factor authentication and contact an organization owner.

We strongly recommend using two-factor authentication (2FA) to secure your account. If you need to disable 2FA, we recommend re-enabling it as soon as possible.

If you are part of the group that GitHub is requiring to enroll in 2FA in 2023, you cannot disable 2FA. A banner will display in your authentication settings to remind you that you are not allowed to disable 2FA. For more information about our 2023 2FA enrollment rollout for contributors to GitHub.com, see this blog post.

You can modify your existing 2FA configuration instead of disabling it entirely. For more information, see "Changing your two-factor authentication method."

If your organization requires two-factor authentication and you're a member, owner, or an outside collaborator on a private repository of your organization, you must first leave your organization before you can disable two-factor authentication.

To remove yourself from your organization:

  1. In the upper-right corner of any page, click your profile photo, then click Settings.

    Screenshot of a user's account menu on GitHub. The menu item "Settings" is outlined in dark orange.

  2. In the "Access" section of the sidebar, click Password and authentication.

  3. Hover over Enabled, then click Disable.

    Screenshot of an account's 2FA settings. A green button labeled "Enabled" is outlined in orange.

  4. If necessary, enter your password or perform 2FA once more to disable 2FA for your GitHub account.

Further reading