Facebook Logout and confirm sign out status

Whenever you login to Facebook, a "session" is created that allows the social network to "remember" who you are. If you have opted to make Facebook remember your password, you will automatically remain signed in so long as the cookie (small text file created by your web browser) is not erased, and does not expire. To logout of Facebook, you need to manually kill that session, as you'll learn in this tutorial; closing the browser window is not enough, unless you anonymously login to Facebook, but this is the only case. We will also show you how to confirm that you are in fact completely signed out, an especially important step to take when you are checking your account from a public computer.

Tip: this tutorial focuses on logging out of Facebook from the current computer; to force other computers using your profile to sign out, see our "Facebook Login Activity" tutorial - the last section explains how to force a manual logout!

Manually logout of your Facebook account

If needed, go to any page Facebook: if you are currently signed in, you will not see a login form at the top; instead, you'll see your name, and a thumbnail of your profile picture, as shown below:

Facebook recently removed the "Account" link in the top right corner of the page, and has replaced it with the "down arrow" icon: click on it to show the dropdown menu. Then, click on the "Log Out" link:

Facebook will then redirect you to its homepage (www.facebook.com or www.facebook.com/index.php), which shows a sign in form at the top, and a sign up form on the page itself (which the one you use to create a Facebook account). That simple action should have logged you out completely, but let's go a step further and confirm that you are in fact completely signed out for this browser.

Tip: when you logout of Facebook as described above, it only signs you out for the web browser you are currently using. Make sure to repeat that operation from every browser you've used to check your Facebook account!

Confirm sign out status

Close the current browser window or browser tab, and relaunch the web browser; then, navigate to any page on Facebook. If you are completely signed out, you will see the standard login form in the top right corner of the screen (whatever page you happen to be on will show it).


Some web browsers like Internet Explorer or Firefox have a feature called "AutoComplete", which allows you to start typing a username (in the case of Facebook, and email account), and will automatically enter the corresponding password when you select it. Double-click inside the "Email" text field of the login form shown above, and see if it deploys a dropdown of suggestions (aka "AutoComplete matches") that includes the email address of the account of which you just signed out. If so, you will need to remove it: learn how to Delete AutoComplete from Internet Explorer or Delete AutoComplete entries from Firefox.

You now know how to logout of Facebook, how to double-check that you are in fact signed out, and even how to erase traces of your visit: while any page you visited on Facebook may still appear in the web browser's history, clicking on them will require the person to login to their Facebook account.