How to See What Google Knows About You: Takeout and My Activity

Originally published 2019-08-24.

You can see much of what Google has stored about you by downloading your data through Google Takeout (takeout.google.com) and by browsing your activity at myactivity.google.com. In 2018 one web developer did exactly that and found an archive of about 5.5 GB, roughly nine times the size of his Facebook download. His experience is a useful starting point, but the more important lesson is how to read your own archive and decide what you want Google to keep.

What a Google Data Download Can Reveal About Your Account

The download that went viral

In March 2018, as the Cambridge Analytica scandal put Facebook under pressure, web developer and technical consultant Dylan Curran posted a long Twitter thread comparing the data Facebook and Google held on him. According to Al Jazeera's report on the thread, his Facebook archive came to about 600 MB, while his Google archive was around 5.5 GB. He compared the Google file to roughly three million Word documents.

Among the things he highlighted:

Location history going back years, viewable as a map timeline of where his phone had been, provided the setting was switched on.
Search history stored in his account, with around 90,000 entries, including searches he had deleted from his devices.
YouTube history, covering videos watched and searches made.
An advertising profile estimating interests, age, gender and other traits used to target ads.
Files and events in Google Drive and Calendar, including items he thought he had removed.

The thread was shared widely, and many outlets summed it up as "Google has ten times more data on you than Facebook." That headline needs some care.

Why archive size is a poor yardstick

A single person's download cannot prove a fixed ratio between two companies for everyone. The size of a Google archive depends heavily on which services you use and what you store in them. Photos, videos, email attachments and Drive files take up far more space than thousands of lines of search history. Someone who backs up their phone photos to Google will have an enormous archive; someone who only uses Search may have a small one.

Facebook archives vary in the same way, depending on how many photos and videos you have posted and whether you choose high or low media quality when exporting. So the sensible question is not "how many gigabytes" but "what categories of information are in here, and do I want them kept?"

How to download your Google data

Google's export tool, now usually called Google Takeout or "Download your data", was launched in 2011 by an internal team known as the Data Liberation Front. Google's help pages describe the process roughly like this:

Sign in and go to takeout.google.com. The products you use are preselected; untick any you do not need.
Choose how to receive the file: a download link by email, or delivery to Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive or Box.
Pick a one-time export or scheduled exports every two months for a year.
Choose a file type (ZIP or TGZ) and a maximum archive size. Large exports are split into several parts.
Create the export and wait. It can take minutes or, for big accounts, several days.

Download links expire after about a week. Google also notes that downloading a copy does not delete anything from its servers. Once you have the archive, open the included archive_browser.html file, which explains what each folder contains. Doing this on a computer is easier than on a phone.

What you are likely to find

Broadly, Google describes the data it holds in three groups: things you do (searches, videos watched, places visited, apps used), things you create (emails, documents, photos, calendar entries) and things that identify you (name, birthday, phone number, payment details). In practice, the most eye-opening parts of an archive tend to be:

My Activity. A timeline of searches, sites visited in Chrome while signed in, apps used on Android and other actions tied to your account. Google introduced the My Activity page in 2016, a year after launching the My Account hub.
Location data. If you turned on Location History (now called Timeline), it may show trips, places and routes in detail.
Voice and audio activity. If enabled, recordings from voice searches and the Assistant. Google says this setting is off unless you choose to turn it on.
Ad settings. The interests and demographics Google has inferred to personalise ads.

Settings worth reviewing today

You do not need to delete your account to reduce what is stored. A few settings make a big difference:

Web & App Activity. In your Google Account under Data & privacy, you can pause this or set an auto-delete period so older activity is removed automatically. Pausing stops new items from being saved but does not erase existing ones; delete those separately in My Activity.
Timeline (Location History). Google now says Timeline is off by default and, where it is used, the data is stored on your phone, with an optional encrypted backup. You can turn it off or delete it from My Google Activity, or delete parts of it in the Maps app.
YouTube History. Pause watch and search history or set it to auto-delete.
Ad personalisation. Review or switch off personalised ads in the ad settings of your account.
Privacy Checkup. Google's guided checkup walks through the main settings in a few minutes and is a good yearly habit.

Some data is also tied to specific products, such as Gmail messages or Drive files, and stays until you delete it yourself.

Myths and facts about Google and your data

"Google sells your personal data to advertisers." Google states it never sells your personal information to anyone. What it does is use your information to show targeted ads on its own services and partner sites, which is how it earns most of its money. The privacy concern is real, but the mechanism is targeting rather than handing over files.
"Incognito mode makes you invisible." Private browsing mainly stops your history and cookies being saved on your own device. Websites, your employer or school network and your internet provider can still see activity. In December 2023 Google agreed to settle a US class action alleging it tracked people while they browsed privately.
"Deleting history on my phone deletes it everywhere." Not necessarily. Curran found that searches cleared from a device could still be stored in his account. Check My Activity as well.
"Turning off location services stops all location data." Your approximate location can also be inferred from your IP address and from activity in other apps. Turning off Timeline and reviewing Web & App Activity covers the main sources tied to your Google Account.

The bigger picture

Google is not alone. Apple, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta also collect large amounts of information, and most offer their own download tools. Exporting your data from each service once a year is an eye-opening exercise: it shows how much of daily life is now recorded and helps you make deliberate choices instead of accepting defaults.

The goal is not panic but control. Look at what is stored, keep what is useful to you, such as photos and documents, and switch off or auto-delete the tracking you do not want. A small amount of time spent in your account settings goes a long way.