How to check which devices are signed in to your account

Your phone account outlives your phones. Every handset, tablet, laptop and browser you’ve signed in with can stay attached to it for years: the phone you traded in, the family computer, a work laptop, a friend’s tablet you used once. Each one that’s still signed in may be syncing your photos, receiving your sign-in codes or showing your messages. Checking the list takes two minutes and is one of the most useful privacy habits there is.

On Android

Your Android phone is tied to your online account. To see where else it’s in use:

1. Open Settings, then tap your account (or open your account settings in a browser).
2. Tap Security & sign-in.
3. Under Your devices, tap Manage all devices.

You’ll see devices where you’re signed in now or have been in the last few weeks. Signed-out ones are marked as such. Tap any device for details such as its model, rough location and the apps or browsers involved.

To remove one, tap it and choose to sign out. If you don’t recognize it, follow the prompts to secure your account, which include changing your password.

On iPhone

1. Open Settings and tap your name at the top.
2. Scroll down to the list of devices.
3. Tap a device to see its details.
4. To sign it out, tap Remove from Account and confirm.

The list includes iPhones, iPads and Macs, but also other devices you’ve used with your account, such as Android phones, Windows computers and TV streaming devices.

From a computer or another phone, sign in to your account on the web and open Devices.

A removed device loses access to cloud storage, finding your devices and your sign-in codes. It won’t reappear unless it’s signed in again. If it’s a device you still own, sign out on the device itself too.

Reading the list

Some entries can be confusing. A few things the official help explains:

• Times can look too recent. The time shown is the last contact with the account, including background syncing, not the last time a person used it.
• One device can have several sessions. Signing in on a new browser, app or private window creates another entry. Multiple sessions on the same model are usually you.

What to remove

Sign out anything that’s:

• not yours, or that you don’t recognize;
• gone: sold, traded in, broken, lost or given away;
• shared: a family computer or a friend’s device you signed in on once;
• from a past relationship or job, such as a partner’s laptop or an old work phone.

After removing a device

1. Change your password if anything was unfamiliar. Removing a device doesn’t stop it signing in again with the old password.
2. Turn on two-step verification, so a password alone isn’t enough. See protecting your photo backup account.
3. Check your recovery email and phone number are still yours.
4. Look at shared albums and location sharing, which work through people rather than devices.

On iPhone, Safety Check walks through devices, sharing and passwords in one place.

Photos that aren’t tied to an account

Everything synced to your account is only as private as the list of devices that can reach it. Photos kept in an app without an account don’t appear on any of them. Silo, coming soon to iPhone and Android, has no sign-up and no server account: its vault stays on the phone, encrypted under its own PIN.