How To Delete Game Activity In Steam

On Steam, the games you play are visible to your Steam friends, followers, and other Steam users. For those who prefer to keep their activity invisible to prying eyes, there’s hope. There are ways to delete your Steam game activity.

More accurately, you’ll learn how to hide game activity on Steam.

There’s no way to directly delete your Steam Game history as you would with browser history or Google Search history. Therefore, hiding your activity is the only option other than faking your game history—using other games to hide what you’ve just played.

Simply put, there isn’t a true way to “delete” your Steam game activity, but you can use other games to hide what you’ve just played. It’s not a true deletion – a new game simply takes the older games’ place in the slots. This is the key behind one of the methods we’ll talk about later.

Without further ado, let’s take a look at the methods of hiding your game activity in Steam.

Changing Your Privacy Settings on Steam

In 2020, Steam released an update that finally made it easier to change your account privacy. This method is the best on our list, and almost every user is capable of using it to hide game activity on Steam. Everything else on your account will remain the same, so you can trust it to keep your account private.

To modify your privacy settings, you can follow these steps:

1. Launch Steam on your computer.
   
2. Find your username at the top of the screen and click it.
   
3. From the drop-down menu that appears, select “Profile.”
   
4. You’ll be directed to a new screen. Select “Edit Profile” on the right.
   
5. Select “Privacy Settings” on the left side of the screen.
   
6. Find “My Profile” in this new section.
   
7. Under “My Profile,” there are individual options. Change “My Profile” to “Private” to hide all information or select “Game details” and choose “Private” to only hide game information.
   
8. If you want to test this, open a new browser and paste the link to your Steam profile, which is found under “Edit Profile -> General.”
   
9. If your game activity is hidden, then you’ve succeeded.
   

From now on, you’re the only one that can see your game activity. Other visitors to your profile page, be they friends, followers, or other Steam users, are prevented from seeing these slots. To reverse this, you can follow the steps and set your privacy from Private to Public again.

By default, your Steam profile is Public. Everyone can see what you played earlier.

Hiding Your Games Manually

If you don’t want to make your account private, you can use the method below. You have the power to hide certain games you wish to keep away from prying eyes. There are two ways you can keep the activity from appearing on your profile.

The first method is as follows:

1. Launch Steam.
   
2. Go to your profile.
   
3. Click your status.
4. Set your status to “Invisible.”
   
5. Open the game you want to play and enjoy it as long as you want.
   
6. When you’re done playing, open another game for a minute or two.
7. Go back to being “Online” on Steam.
   

Since Steam only displays the most recently opened game, the game you’re trying to hide won’t appear. The older game is now hidden.

However, this method isn’t exactly accessible for everyone. Not everyone has a strong PC that can run many games at once, and some laptops struggle to run multiple games. A workaround is to only open simple games that won’t tax your computer’s hardware.

If you do have a powerful gaming PC, then by all means open as many games as you want to hide your game activity.

The second method is different, and goes like this:

1. Launch Steam.
   
2. Go to your library.
   
3. Find the game you want to hide manually.
   
4. Right-click it with your mouse.
5. Select “Manage.”
   
6. Select “Hide This Game.”
   

This will only hide the game from those without access to your Steam library. If you let someone access your games, they can always find it by showing hidden games.

If you want to restore those games to their previous status, you can use the same steps to unhide these games. However, from then on, your friends and everyone else will be able to see it appear on your recent game activity. This is where the next method can come in handy.

Free Watchable Episodes on Steam

A YouTube video made the rounds on the internet because it used a strange exploit to clear out the recently played game slots. By watching free episodes for certain videos you can find on Steam, you can hide your Steam game activity. Simply choose a mini-documentary or other videos on Steam.

For our example, we’ll use ‘’Making of Furi’’ just like in the video.

1. Launch Steam on your computer.
   
2. Go to the Store on the top ribbon.
   
3. Search for “Making of Furi.”
   
4. Select the Steam listing of the mini-documentaries.
   
5. Watch Episode 1, but close the window the moment it appears.
   
6. Repeat these actions for the other two or three episodes.
7. You can go back to your profile and check if your game activity has been cleared.
   

Because the videos technically didn’t load fully according to the Steam app, the recent activity slots will be cleared. It only takes a minute or two to finish as well.

You can do this as many times as you want, too. Steam doesn’t prohibit you from watching the same video again.

Setting Your Profile to Private

The first method mentioned hiding your game details. This will keep your game activity private, but if you want more privacy, you can always set your entire account to Private. However, there are some consequences.

The moment your profile becomes private; no one will see the following:

• Your friends’ list
• Your game details
• Your Steam inventory

This applies to game developers, friends, followers, other Steam users, and more. You’ve essentially locked your profile down completely. Furthermore, the ability to comment on other posts becomes extremely limited from now on. Before you make your profile private, make sure you’re okay with this before proceeding.

The steps to making your entire Steam account private are:

1. Launch Steam on your computer.
   
2. Find your username at the top of the screen and click it.
   
3. From the drop-down menu that appears, select “Profile.”
   
4. You’ll be directed to a new screen, and now you must select “Edit Profile” on the right.
   
5. Locate “My Privacy Settings” on the right side of the screen.
   
6. Find “My Profile” in this new section.
   
7. When you see “Public” linked to “My Profile,” click on it and select “Private” from the drop-down menu.
   
8. If you want to test this, open a new browser and paste the link to your Steam profile.
   
9. Now, no one else can spy on your game activity or anything else.

Making your profile private allows you to do anything you want. After all, only you can see what you’ve been up to.

How to Remove a Game From Steam?

If you want to delete a game from your library on Steam, simply follow the instructions below.

1. Launch Steam.
   
2. Navigate to the “Help” section.
   
3. Select “Steam Support.”
   
4. In the search bar, type the name of the game you want to remove.
   
5. Select the game.
   
6. Select the option to permanently delete the selected game.
   
7. Confirm your decision to remove the game from your Steam account.

Unfortunately, removing the game from your account this way doesn’t mean the information such as playtime and achievements go away. If you don’t want anyone seeing this information, you’ll have to hide it through the above methods or simply create a new Steam account.

All your achievements and playtime can be seen unless you set it to private, so a new account is the only option that allows you to get a “clean slate” once more.

Steam FAQs

Can You Delete Activity Permanently?

No, you cannot. Your recent activity can only be hidden through changing privacy settings, be it recent game activity or liking and sharing Steam posts. You can still hide it, however.

Can You Reset Steam Game Play Time?

The answer is also no, as you can’t disable the tracking system at all. If you want to start again, the only way is to create a new account.

What Were You Playing Yesterday?

Now that you know how to “delete” Steam game activity, you can hide it from anyone you wish. What you’re playing will be a mystery to others, even your friends. The only exception is the users with access to your library.

How many games do you own on Steam? What’s your Steam profile status? Tells us in the comments section below.