Preparing Your Mac for Sale or Trade-In
Selling a Mac without wiping it properly is one of the easiest ways to leak years of personal data.
Quick answer
Before selling a Mac: back it up, sign out of iCloud, iMessage, and the App Store, turn off Find My, unpair Bluetooth accessories, and then use Erase All Content and Settings (Apple Silicon and T2 Macs) or erase the drive in Recovery and reinstall macOS. Never hand over a Mac still tied to your Apple ID.
Back up first. Time Machine to an external drive, then verify the backup mounts and you can browse it. Do not skip this step. Once you erase, your data is gone.
Sign out of iCloud, iMessage, and the App Store. On Apple Silicon and T2 Macs, also turn off Find My Mac and Activation Lock. A buyer with an Activation-locked Mac has a paperweight, and you'll be hearing from them.
Use Erase All Content and Settings under System Settings, General, Transfer or Reset. This is the modern, safe equivalent of a clean install on Apple Silicon and T2 Macs. It wipes user data while preserving the OS.
On older Intel Macs without a T2 chip, boot to Recovery, erase the drive in Disk Utility as APFS, then reinstall macOS. Walk away once you reach the setup assistant — let the buyer set it up as their own.
If any of this makes you nervous, this is a 30-minute house call. I wipe Macs for trade-in or private sale every week, and I'll make sure your data is gone and theirs starts clean.
Frequently asked
How do I factory reset a Mac?
On Apple Silicon and T2 Macs, use System Settings > General > Transfer or Reset > Erase All Content and Settings. On older Macs, boot to Recovery, erase the drive in Disk Utility, and reinstall macOS.
What happens if I sell a Mac without signing out of iCloud?
Activation Lock can leave the buyer with an unusable machine, and your account stays associated with it. Always sign out and disable Find My first.
Should I erase a Mac before trade-in?
Yes. Back up first, then erase — trade-in programs do not guarantee your data is wiped before resale.
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