Hotmail was one of the first email services to appear, and the most widely used for many years. It wasn't until the arrival of Google and its Gmail that Microsoft's service began to lose popularity. It is possible that you have an account created in Hotmail for years, but you do not remember the password. Today we explain how to recover an old Hotmail account .
The great popularity of the Hotmail email service led Microsoft to buy it in 1997. If you were born in the 90s, it is very likely that you learned to use email at school, and surely Hotmail was the option chosen by your teacher.
So many years later, Hotmail is still fully functional , although Microsoft prefers that users use Outlook accounts, its email service that was built on the basis of Hotmail.
The Hotmail service has been fully integrated into Outlook for approximately six years, so you will have to resort to the official Microsoft website if you want to make any questions or changes, and even to enter your old Hotmail account.
How to recover your Hotmail account step by step
After this introduction we can start with our tutorial on how to regain access to your old Hotmail account. The process is very simple, and we will indicate everything step by step so that you do not have problems. This procedure is very important after recent massive password leaks from mail services. Imagine that criminals gain access to your account in which you have sensitive information.
Microsoft's service contract says that if you don't use your Hotmail account for more than a year, it is deleted along with all its content , including messages, photos, links and everything you have stored. This means that, if you have exceeded this period of time, it will be impossible for you to recover your email account.
We leave you a video from our YouTube channel which also explains how to recover an account:
If you are not sure, you can try to recover your account, you do not lose anything by trying. The first step will be to go to the official login page in Outlook. It will ask you for your password and you will have an option to recover it if you have forgotten it. click on "I forgot my password" to continue.
A new window will appear in which you will have to enter the email of the account you want to recover . Once you have put it, click on "Next". You will need to know this information, so if you do not remember your email address, you will not be able to recover the account. Fortunately, there is also a way to get it back.
Now it will ask you to use an alternate email to receive a recovery key for your old account. If you do not have another active email you can create an account, it is totally free. Write your alternative email address and click on "Get code."
After that you will receive an email with a code that you will have to use to recover your old account. We leave you an image with an example of the email you will receive, as well as the password you will need to use. Normally this email will reach you in a few minutes, although it may be a little longer.
You only have to put the code and click on "Next".
After a few seconds you will have to set a new password for your Hotmail account. You will have to enter the password twice to ensure that there are no errors, an important security measure that almost all systems already include. After that click on "Next".
With this you will have changed the password of your Hotmail email account and you will now be able to access its content. In this way you will be able to check if you have received relevant information, and most important of all, you will be able to check if your account has been safe after the leaks of passwords and credentials that have occurred.
How to retrieve my username
If you do not remember your username, it is possible to recover it, although for this you will have to have a second email account linked to the one you want to recover. The process is also quite simple, the first thing you need to do is click on " Login options ".
A menu will open with three options, in this case we are interested in the one at the bottom, "I forgot my username." It should be noted that this process is only possible in personal accounts for security reasons. They also offer you the possibilities of using a security key or a GitHub account, although in both cases you will have to have configured it in advance for the process to work.
Now you will have to enter the email account that you have linked to the one you want to recover. Once you have put it, click on "Next". It is important that you have a linked email account, otherwise you will not be able to use this option to recover your username.
You will receive an email with a verification code in the email you just entered. The email you will receive is the same as the one we have shown you before, so you will not have problems locating the corresponding code. You just have to put it in and click on "Next".
A list will appear with all the associated user names, click on " Login " and you will be able to access your Hotmail account. From here you can make normal use of your email account, make sure to write down the username in a place that you always have at hand so that you will not forget it again.
We hope this tutorial is very useful for you to recover a Hotmail account. If you liked it, you can share it on social networks so that it can help many more users who need it. You can also leave a comment with your experience.