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What Happens If I Sign Out of My Apple ID

Do you want to know what happens if you sign out of your Apple ID? We know that signing out of an Apple ID without knowing what will happen can be a terrifying thought especially when you are not geeky. Will your photos, apps, files, notes, and documents be deleted or lost? To reduce your data loss risk, we have decided to create a comprehensive guide explaining what happens if you sign out of your Apple ID.

what happens when you sign out of apple id
What Happens When You Sign Out of Apple ID

What Happens When You Sign Out of Apple ID? Briefly speaking, your iCloud account associated data will be removed along with your Apple ID on your iPhone unless you choose to keep some data on your iPhone, but they still stay on the iCloud account if you've synced iPhone with iCloud or backed up them successfully on the iCloud, with enough space and regular backups.

Your Apple ID is your personal account to sign in to all Apple services, the most important gateway for the entire Apple universe. You can log in to your Apple ID to access Apple services like the App Store, Apple Music, iCloud, iMessage, FaceTime, Apple Books, Find My, iTunes, Apple TV, Family Sharing, and more.

Notice:

When the Sign out option is red and clickable and you have the Apple ID & password, you can directly sign out your Apple ID via tapping it and entering your Apple ID & password.

When you see "Sign out is not available due to restrictions", read our tutorial How to Fix Apple ID Sign Out is Not Available Due to Restrictions.

When you can't sign out of your Apple ID, refer to the article below:

Why I Can’t Sign Out of Apple ID on iPhone

When you have no Apple ID or password and want to sign out of the iCloud account, read the below article:

How to Sign Out of Apple ID without Password

Quick Answers to the question that what happens if you sign out of your Apple ID.

You can sign out of your Apple ID from one of your devices or multiple devices to stop using iCloud. When you sign out of your Apple ID account, you’ll be asked if you want to keep a copy of the information that you store in iCloud on your iPhone, iPad or Mac. Meantime, you can’t access or use many iCloud services on your device after your sign out of your iCloud account. We’ll list them in detail.

what happens if you sign out of your Apple ID-Keep a copy
What happens if you sign out of your Apple ID-Keep a copy

1. iCloud Photos, iCloud Backups, Shared Albums - Photos and Backup Categories.

If you’ve turned on iCloud Photos, when you sign out of Apple ID, you may have some possibilities to lose your photos.

The photos on your iPhone might stay there or they might disappear completely depending on which of Apple’s photo services and settings you are using.

When you turn on "Optimize iPhone Storage", photos and videos have been optimized to save space. When you turn off iCloud Photos before signing out of your Apple ID, you will be asked to remove them from the iPhone or download and keep original photos and videos. Check that from Settings > Your Name > iCloud > Photos.

optimize iPhone storage-iCloud Photos
Optimize iPhone storage-iCloud Photos

When you directly sign out your Apple ID with Optimize iPhone Storage settings, you may lose some videos or photos.

If you choose Remove them from iPhone, you will lose them from your device. Next time when you sign in your Apple ID, you’ll get these synced photos or videos on iCloud. To check if all the photos are synced in your iCloud account, go to the website version of iCloud.

If you’ve turned on the automatically iCloud backup of iCloud photos, and make sure they’re backed up successfully, they will be there once you login into your account.

iCloud Backup will be terminated.

Shared albums will be removed if they are addressed to your Apple ID.

2. Messages in iCloud.

Messages conversations will be lost if they are addressed to the Apple ID. Messages in iCloud will be removed when you sign out of your Apple ID. However, Messages will be on your iPhone if you use a phone number to receive the iMessages or SMS messages.  If you used your Apple ID to send & receive messages, you will not be able to send iMessage texts or make FaceTime call when you sign out of your Apple ID.

Check if your messages are synced on iCloud via Settings > iCloud > Messages.

Check if your messages are sent from your Apple ID or your phone number via Settings > Messages > Send & Recieve.

3. iCloud Drive, iCloud Mail, iCloud Keychain, Shared Pages, Numbers, and Keynote documents - Documents & Passwords Categories.

iCloud Drive location is unavailable when you sign out of your Apple ID. You’ll be asked to save your documents and files to your iPhone.

Your device is now signed off from Apple iCloud Services including iCloud Mail. You are not signed off from the other third-party mails like Google, Outlook mail, etc.

Numbers and Keynote documents stored in iCloud will be removed.

You will be asked if you’d like to keep a copy of your iCloud Keychain when you log out of your Apple ID. If you won’t toggle it to green, the passwords will be removed completely.

 4. Apple Pay, Apple Cash, and Apple Card, Car Keys.

All items will be removed from Wallet. Your Apple Cash and Apple Card accounts are linked to your Apple ID. They will be removed when you sign out of your Apple ID. You’ll need to add them when you sign in to a new one.

Car keys are also permanently removed and you will need to manually add them again.

5. Find My iPhone/iPad.

Find My iPhone/iPad is required to be turned off from your iPhone before you sign out of your Apple ID.

Thus, you can’t use find my iPhone unless you sign in to your iCloud account again.

6. Voice Memos, Shared Notes, Reminders.

Voice Memos, Shared Notes, Reminders in iCloud will be removed from your device. They will be unavailable when you sign out of your Apple ID. You’ll find them once you sign in to your iCloud account if they are synced successfully.

7. App data for any third-party apps that you’ve installed that use iCloud.

App data that you’ve saved in iCloud will be removed completely when you sign out of your iCloud.

8. Apps that are installed from the App store.

Apps installed will be staying there, but you won’t update them when you sign out of your Apple ID.

If you want to update your apps, remove them and reinstall them with your current Apple ID or update them, or sign in to your previous Apple ID to update the apps.

9. Apple Books.

Books contents addressed with your iCloud account will be removed when you log out of your Apple ID. You’ll have no access to your library.

10. Music and Family Sharing contents.

After logging out of Apple ID, you will log out of Apple Music, it is expected access to the content you had with Apple Music would be removed. When you log back into Apple Music, your content will become available again once you've also enabled Sync Library and Show Apple Music in Settings > Music> Show Apple Music.

Family sharing contents and purchase sharing will be unavailable if you sign out of your Apple ID. These contents are attached and shared by your Apple ID.

In a word, there are a lot of changes when you sign out of Apple ID on your devices. To keep all your data safe, please do back up your data before you sign out of your Apple ID.

Why Can’t I Sign Out of iCloud?

How to Sign Out of Apple ID without Password.

How to Factory Reset iPhone 11 without Password.

How Do I Sign Out A Child’s Apple ID from My iPad/iPhone?

I am the chief editor of softwaredive.com. I have been engaged in software and computer gadgets fields for over 10 years, offering proven guides, tips, and software solutions in data recovery, and multimedia field.

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