Preparing a laptop for sale, Mac or Windows
A laptop carries more accounts than a phone and more licences than anyone remembers. Here is the order to unpick them in.
A laptop has been in your life longer than a phone and has more of you on it: licences, saved logins, an email client, ten years of documents. Work through it in this order and nothing gets left behind.
1. Back up, and open the backup
An external drive, Time Machine, OneDrive, Google Drive — whichever you already use. Then open a few files from the copy. A backup you have not opened is a hope, not a backup.
Do not forget the things that are not in Documents: browser bookmarks and saved passwords, an email archive stored locally, project files inside an app's own folder, and anything on the Desktop.
2. Deauthorise what is licensed
This is the step people skip and regret. Sign out of Adobe Creative Cloud, deactivate Office, sign out of iTunes or Music if it is authorised on the machine, and sign out of any app with a device limit. A seat left active on a laptop you no longer own is a seat you cannot use.
3. Sign out of the accounts
On a Mac. System Settings → your name → iCloud → Find My Mac → off. Then sign out of your Apple ID entirely. On Apple silicon and T2 machines, Find My is Activation Lock: leave it on and the next owner cannot set the machine up at all.
On Windows. Settings → Accounts → sign out of the Microsoft account, and remove the device from your Microsoft account online so it stops appearing in your device list. If the machine is on a work domain or has BitLocker enabled by an employer, sort that out with them before selling it.
4. Unpair and unplug
Bluetooth mice, headphones, a second display, a security dongle. Take out any SD card, and unplug an external drive you meant to keep.
5. Leave the wipe to us
Our agent resets the laptop in front of you as part of the handover. That is deliberate: the erase happens where you can watch it, and a machine that still boots to a desktop is far quicker to check against the answers you gave.
6. Find the charger
It adds to the price, and a laptop that cannot be powered on cannot be checked properly. What decides a used laptop's price covers the rest.
See what your laptop is worth
A price in about a minute, free doorstep pickup in a two-hour slot, and paid — cash or bank transfer — before our agent leaves.
Questions people ask
- Should I wipe the laptop myself?
- No. Our agent resets it in front of you at pickup, so the wipe happens where you can see it — and a machine that still boots is quicker to check against your answers.
- Does Activation Lock apply to a MacBook?
- Yes, on Macs with Apple silicon or a T2 chip. A Mac with Find My still on is locked to your Apple ID and cannot be set up by anyone else.
- What happens to my software licences?
- Some are tied to the machine. Deauthorise Adobe and sign out of Office before the laptop leaves, or the seat stays used up on a computer you no longer own.