I’m using GitHub with a basic free account and I noticed something that bothers me. Every single action I take on the platform gets displayed publicly in my activity timeline. This includes all my commits, repository interactions, and basically everything I do on the site.
The problem is that even small changes or test commits show up for everyone to see. I’ve looked through my account settings but can’t find any clear option to make my activity private or turn off this public feed feature.
Does anyone know if there’s a way to hide these public activities from showing up on my profile? I’d prefer to keep my development work more private if possible.
GitHub doesn’t let you completely hide your activity feed on free accounts, but you’ve got some options. Your timeline mostly shows what you do with public repos, so switch to private ones for personal projects. Free accounts get unlimited private repos now, and anything you do there won’t show up publicly. You can also be pickier about when you push - work locally and only push the important stuff instead of every little test commit. Just know that stars, follows, and public repos will still show up no matter what.
There’s no single toggle to disable your activity feed on free GitHub accounts. Most of what people see comes from public repos, so just make your repositories private when you don’t want the activity showing up. I’ve done this for years - keeps my experimental stuff and constant commits hidden while I can still show off finished projects. I also changed how I work with public repos. Instead of pushing every tiny change, I bundle related stuff together before committing. Your feed will still show things like follows and stars, but this cuts out most of the development noise.
Yeah, super annoying! Making repos private definitely helps. I also keep my commits low-key - do more work locally and bundle changes before pushing. Keeps the feed clean.