Recovering Your Account If You Lose Your 2fa Credentials Github Docs

Leo Migdal

-Nov 18, 2025, 9:49 AM

recovering your account if you lose your 2fa credentials github docs

If you lose access to your two-factor authentication credentials, you can use your recovery codes, or another recovery option, to regain access to your account. For security reasons, GitHub Support will not be able to restore access to accounts with two-factor authentication enabled if you lose your two-factor authentication credentials or lose access to your account recovery methods. If you cannot use any recovery methods, you have permanently lost access to your account. However, you can unlink an email address tied to the locked account. The unlinked email address can then be linked to a new or existing account. For more information, see Unlinking your email address from a locked account.

Use one of your recovery codes to automatically regain entry into your account. You may have saved your recovery codes to a password manager or your computer's downloads folder. The default filename for recovery codes is github-recovery-codes.txt. For more information about recovery codes, see Configuring two-factor authentication recovery methods. If you do not know your password, you can use a recovery code after requesting a new password. See Updating your GitHub access credentials.

There was an error while loading. Please reload this page. You can set up a variety of recovery methods to access your account if you lose your two-factor authentication credentials. In addition to securely storing your two-factor authentication (2FA) recovery codes, we strongly recommend configuring two or more authentication methods to avoid losing access to your account. For more information, see Configuring two-factor authentication. When you configure two-factor authentication, you'll download and save your 2FA recovery codes.

If you lose access to your phone, you can authenticate to GitHub using your recovery codes. You can also download your recovery codes at any point after enabling two-factor authentication. To keep your account secure, don't share or distribute your recovery codes. We recommend saving them with a secure password manager. If you generate new recovery codes or disable and re-enable 2FA, the recovery codes in your security settings automatically update. Reconfiguring your 2FA settings without disabling 2FA will not change your recovery codes.

There was an error while loading. Please reload this page. I lost access to my GitHub account due to two-factor authentication issues. Unfortunately: I no longer have access to my 2FA application, And the email address linked to the account has recently been deleted.

Beta Was this translation helpful? Give feedback. There was an error while loading. Please reload this page. How to recover 2FA or security key to login to github profile? Help me

Beta Was this translation helpful? Give feedback. There was an error while loading. Please reload this page. you might be able to access your account if you have access to a verified phone, check this docs: https://docs.github.com/en/authentication/securing-your-account-with-two-factor-authentication-2fa/recovering-your-account-if-you-lose-your-2fa-credentials or contact github support There was an error while loading.

Please reload this page. There was an error while loading. Please reload this page. Hey folks, My main account named @AhmedGrati is locked due to 2fa. I actually lost my 2FA device, and I don't have any access to the recovery codes. I have access to all accounts linked to the account, and I have access to the account from my local machine.

I submitted a ticket 3 days ago, but I haven't gotten a response yet. I want to know whether I can recover my account since I have a lot of open-source work that I can't lose, and how I should proceed in the current situation. Beta Was this translation helpful? Give feedback. Looks like you'll need to open a support ticket: GitHub credentials include your password, access tokens, SSH keys, and application API tokens used to communicate with GitHub.

You can reset all of these access credentials yourself. To request a new password, visit https://github.com/password_reset. Enter the email address associated with your account, then click Send password reset email. Only primary and backup email addresses can be used to request a new password. Unless you have previously chosen a specific backup email address, all verified emails are considered backup email addresses. GitHub will email you a link that will allow you to reset your password.

You must click on this link within 3 hours of receiving the email. If you didn't receive an email from us, make sure to check your spam folder. You can set up your account on GitHub to require an authentication code in addition to your password when you sign in. As of March 2023, GitHub required all users who contribute code on GitHub.com to enable one or more forms of two-factor authentication (2FA). If you were in an eligible group, you would have received a notification email when that group was selected for enrollment, marking the beginning of a 45-day 2FA enrollment period, and you would have... If you didn't receive a notification, then you were not part of a group required to enable 2FA, though we strongly recommend it.

For more information about the 2FA enrollment rollout, see this blog post. This version of GitHub Enterprise Server will be discontinued on 2026-03-17. No patch releases will be made, even for critical security issues. For better performance, improved security, and new features, upgrade to the latest version of GitHub Enterprise Server. For help with the upgrade, contact GitHub Enterprise support. If you lose access to your two-factor authentication credentials, you can use your recovery codes, or another recovery option, to regain access to your account.

To prompt two-factor authentication, type your username and password, then click Sign in. Managing access to GitHub is a critical task, especially for IT admins who deal with multiple accounts and security measures, and often find themselves troubleshooting issues. In this guide, we'll cover how to recover a GitHub account in case of lost credentials, forgotten passwords, or two-factor authentication (2FA) failures. The goal is to ensure you know all the available options so that you can restore access to an account easily. If you ever lose access to your GitHub account, then there are a variety of ways to recover your account. Each method aims to help you regain control, whether through 2FA codes, email verification, or support requests.

Understanding these options and knowing how to use them is essential for any IT admin overseeing GitHub accounts. The first step is to determine which recovery options you still have access to. Do you still have your two-factor recovery codes? Is your backup email address still accessible? Let's take a closer look at what each recovery option needs. Two-factor authentication adds an extra layer of security to your GitHub account by requiring you to provide a second form of verification, usually in the form of a code sent to your device.

Recovery codes are one-time-use backup codes that you generate and save when enabling 2FA. These codes are like your insurance policy if you lose access to your authenticator app. If you cannot access your authenticator app or device, use one of your saved 2FA recovery codes. Here are the steps to recover using a 2FA recovery code:

Recovering Your Account If You Lose Your 2fa Credentials Github Docs

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