How to delete a Chrome profile
Chrome supports multiple profiles. These profiles allow users to create separate, independent instances of Chrome that are synced with different Google accounts, maintain their own browsing history, and have their own catalog of installed extensions, among other things.
A Chrome profile is ideal if you want to keep work and home browsing separate but it also helps to keep different projects connected to different Gmail accounts separate.
Creating a Chrome profile is easy, and so is removing or deleting one when you no longer need it.
Delete Chrome profile
To delete a Chrome profile, follow these steps.
- Open Chrome (any profile).
- Click the profile icon at the top right.
- In the menu that opens, click the cogwheel button next to Other people.
- In the window that opens, click the more options button at the top right of the profile you want to delete.
- Select the ‘Remove this person’ option.
- You will see a warning telling you the history, passwords, bookmarks, and autofill data will be deleted as well.
- Click Remove this person.
- The Chrome profile will be deleted.
Recover Chrome profile
Recovering a Chrome profile from Chrome is only possible if you set up Chrome sync prior to deleting the profile. If Chrome Sync was set up, you can create a new profile, and use the same Google account to sync all your data back.
If Chrome sync was never set up for the profile, recovering a Chrome profile might only be possible through a recovery app that runs on the desktop. You can point it to the folder that Chrome profiles are saved in, and see what it can recover. Beyond that, there is little that can be done.
The folder for the profile will not be deleted. You can find it in the folder where all Chrome profiles are saved to but there will of course be some files that are missing i.e., files that save your bookmarks and browsing history, etc.
Conclusion
If you think you’ll want to recover a Chrome profile that hasn’t been synced via Chrome sync, it’s a good idea to back up the profile folder first. If you’re not sure where the profile folder for a profile is, you can check the Chrome://version page to find it. The profile folder is saved with a number and not the name that is set for it in Chrome so it will be hard to identify once the profile itself has been deleted. You will have to be proactive about recovering a deleted profile if you don’t use sync for it.
