How do I remove a Steam game from my library?

Question

I like how Steam presents my library to me. However, there is one thing that keeps irritating me every time I open Steam: the Team Fortress 2 Beta. I don't want it, yet it is always in my games list.

Is there a way to permanently remove games from my Steam account; as in, gone forever, not just uninstalling? If I can't do it myself, can the Steam support department do it for me?

EDIT:

I emailed steam support, this is their response.

Thank you for contacting Steam Support.

Games cannot be removed from a Steam account.

You are free to uninstall the game (right-click on the game name and select "Delete local content") and change your game list to show only installed games.

This can be done by clicking "Show" in the upper left-hand corner. From here, select the "Installed" option.

Another option would be to create a new category for only this title and then minimize the category. To create a new Category, please right click the game and choose "Set Category".

Then click on the category name in your Library to collapse the category.

If you have any further questions, please let us know.

As you can see, for now it just means hiding only.

Answer 1

Changing the visibility

As Mr Smooth mentioned, you can use the drop down menu in the library, to only display installed games.

Adding categories

You can also add categories, and add the game(s) to the category, this can be done by right clicking a game, and selecting the "Set category..." button. From there you can add categories.

Contacting Steam support

You can also try to contact Steam support, about removing a game from your library. They should be able to do it. Please note that this may take a bit of arguing, and will require more than one e-mail exchange.

Answer 2

I've just been through this. Steam support are really good at sending canned responses and not great at actually doing anything. The winning argument for me was to quote the Steam subscriber agreement (my emphasis):

10 TERM AND TERMINATION

...

B. Termination by You.

You may cancel your Account at any time. You may cease use of a Subscription at any time or, if you choose, you may request that we terminate your access to a Subscription. However, Subscriptions are not transferable, and even if your access to a Subscription for a particular game or application is terminated, the original activation key will not be able to be registered to any other account, even if the game or application was purchased in a retail store....

I was able to convince them to remove games I no longer wanted with a couple of exceptions where the game was part of a bundle and I wanted to keep other games from the same bundle.

FWIW The first canned response I got was identical to the OP's.

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As requested by @LG102, here's the full email transcript with some sensitive stuff obfuscated...

1 Message by you on Tue, 31st Jul 2012 6:50 pm

I'd like to remove some titles from my library. These are games I either don't like or will never play. Mostly, they came in bundles.

• Cosmic Osmo
• CS:S Beta
• The Manhole
• iBomber Defense
• Dota 2 Test

Many thanks

Apologies if this is auto-sorted to the wrong team but you don't have any option that is a closer match

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2 Message by Support Tech Raymond on Thu, 2nd Aug 2012 9:12 pm

Hello XXX,

Thank you for contacting Steam Support.

You are free to uninstall the game (right-click on the game name and select "Delete local content") and change your game list to show only installed games.

This can be done by clicking "Show" in the upper left-hand corner. From here, select the "Installed" option.

Another option would be to create a new category for only this title and then minimize the category. To create a new Category, please right click the game and choose "Set Category".

Then click on the category name in your Library to collapse the category.

If you have any further questions, please let us know.

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3 Message by you on Thu, 2nd Aug 2012 9:33 pm

Thanks but a) Sorting into a folder doesn't work in "Tile" view and b) That wasn't what I asked.

As per the Steam Subscriber agreement, (10.B)

"Termination by You.

You may cancel your Account at any time. You may cease use of a Subscription at any time or, if you choose, you may request that we terminate your access to a Subscription."

I'm making a request for you to cancel the specified subscriptions.

Are you unwilling or unable to do so?

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4 Message by you on Thu, 2nd Aug 2012 9:35 pm

(To be clear, if cancelling any of the above would also cancel other games, please let me know before proceeding)

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5 Message by Support Tech Raymond on Fri, 3rd Aug 2012 1:45 am

Hello XXX,

Removing Dota 2 Test would require removing Dota 2.

Removing Cosmic Osmo and the Manhole would also require removing the Cyan Complete Bundle. We do not have a way to remove individual games from bundles.

I can assist you in permanently removing the game(s) from your account. However, the game(s) will not be refunded and will not be accessible for future use.

If you wish to play the games again you will need to repurchase them from the Steam store in the future.

If you registered a game with a CD Key and we remove it, the CD Key will no longer be valid and it will not be redeemable in the future.

Please let me know if you would like to proceed with the removal of your game(s).

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6 Message by you on Fri, 3rd Aug 2012 4:13 am

Hi, and thank you for the information.

Please remove Dota 2 (test and full version). Please do NOT remove Cosmic Osmo as I want to keep other software in the bundle.

Please also remove the other titles mentioned.

Thanks for your assistance - much appreciated,

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7 Message by Support Tech Mason on Mon, 6th Aug 2012 7:20 pm

Hello XXX,

Per your request, the titles/games have been removed from your library.

Thank you again for contacting Steam Support.

Answer 3

You can use the drop down menu to only display the games you have installed, which will remove the Team Fortress 2 Beta from view. Then you can just enable "All Games" whenever you want to install a new game.

Answer 4

Another option is, if you are on windows 7 you can right click the steam task bar icon and it will give you a menu of options + games pinned and games recently played. Hopefully it won't show up on the recently played, but if it does you can load up other titles and eventually it will be pushed out of the recently played list IIRC. Or just only use the pinned games list :)

Answer 5

You can uninstall F2p ( Free To Play ) games, to get rid of them. To do so right click on them and select " Delete Local Content..." As for purchased games, you can press on " All Games " that will give you a drop-down menu, then select what you desire, recently played games, installed, all, or even favorites. You can favorite games by right click, and then select " Add to Favorites ".