Will Deactivate Mac Erase Data? What Does Deactivate Mean?

I get a screen prompting me to 'deactivate' my Mac. There is no description of what this means. I completed the deactivation and reset my password. Will it erase all my data?

Will deactivate Mac erase data? Don't worry. Deactivating your Mac will not erase your data. This warning occurs if you forget your Mac's administrator password and need to reset it.

At this time, it will warn you to deactivate your Mac, throwing away the existing passwords keychain and creating new owner identity keys. And the deactivation process will not affect your data.

In summary, this option appears when you forget your Mac login passwords, and you should reset Mac password with three steps:

Step 1. Click 'Deactivate Mac'.

Step 2. Click 'Deactivate' to confirm this process.

Step 3. Reset your administrator passwords.

After it is finished, restart your Mac, your passwords may disappear, and in most cases, your data will not be affected. In this case, you can get your password back with your iCloud keychain, which contains your passwords from different websites and applications.

However, if you can't find some essential files after deactivating your Mac, you can restore them using data recovery software, such as EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard for Mac.

It supports data recovery of various file types under numerous situations, including recovering deleted files without Time Machine. Follow the steps below: