Changing access to github education from old account to new

[ZachDownwardArrow]

🏷️ Discussion Type

Question

💬 Feature/Topic Area

Re-verification/Repeat Application

Hi everyone,

I recently made the mistake of forgetting all of my 2fa methods and have had to make a new account, I'm looking for student benefits but cannot access them because my old account had the same email and already claimed the benefits, now that that email has been unlinked, i still cannot access the benefits, is there some sort of waiting period or can i remove the old account, or anything at all that i can do, or is this due to the activations being paused?

[asaddevx]

Hi @ZachDownwardArrow , losing 2FA access and having to start over is really frustrating. I have been through something similar.

In Short :

No, student benefits cannot be transferred from one account to another. GitHub does not allow this.

But here is what you CAN do:

Option 1: Try to recover your old account

Contact GitHub Support here: https://support.github.com/contact

Select "Two-factor authentication recovery" and explain you lost your 2FA methods. If you can prove you own the account (know the username, old email, etc.), they may help you get back in.

Option 2: Ask Support to revoke benefits from the old account

If recovery is impossible, open a support ticket and ask them to manually revoke the student benefits from your old account. Once revoked, you can reapply with your new account using the same email.

What will NOT work:

• Waiting it out — there is no automatic waiting period
• Unlinking the email yourself — you already did this, but the benefits are still tied to the old account in GitHub's system
• The April subscription pause — this is a different issue unrelated to student benefits

Only GitHub Support can fix this. Open a ticket, explain you lost access to the old account, and ask them to either help you recover it OR revoke the benefits so you can reapply on the new account.

Be patient — support tickets can take 3-5 days.

Good luck!

[snehalathaArakkonam]

Hey, I’ve actually run into something similar before, so I get how frustrating this is.
Short answer — no, student benefits don’t transfer between accounts. Even if you removed the email, the benefits are still tied to your old account internally.
That said, you still have a couple of options:
First, try recovering your old account
If there’s any chance you can get it back, that’s the easiest path. Reach out to GitHub Support and select the 2FA recovery option. If you can provide enough details (username, previous email, etc.), they might be able to help you regain access.
If recovery isn’t possible
Then you’ll need to contact support again and explain the situation. Ask them if they can revoke the student benefits from your old account so you can apply again using your new one. This isn’t something you can do yourself — it has to be handled on their side.
A couple of things that usually don’t work:

Waiting doesn’t reset anything automatically

Removing the email doesn’t detach the benefits

The subscription pause doesn’t affect this specific issue

So yeah, support is really the only way forward here. It might take a few days, but they should be able to guide you or fix it.
Hope that helps a bit.

[snehalathaArakkonam]

🏷️ Discussion Type

Question

💬 Feature/Topic Area

Re-verification/Repeat Application

Hi everyone,

I recently made the mistake of forgetting all of my 2fa methods and have had to make a new account, I'm looking for student benefits but cannot access them because my old account had the same email and already claimed the benefits, now that that email has been unlinked, i still cannot access the benefits, is there some sort of waiting period or can i remove the old account, or anything at all that i can do, or is this due to the activations being paused?

Hey, that’s a rough situation.

What’s happening here is that the student benefits are usually tied to your original account, not just the email. So even if you removed the email from the old account, the system can still recognize that the benefits were already claimed before.

There isn’t really a waiting period in most cases — it’s more about how the system tracks eligibility. Creating a new account with the same email doesn’t automatically reset that.

Also, if activations are currently paused, that can add to the confusion because even valid accounts might not be able to claim benefits right now.

At this point, the best thing you can do is contact support and explain the situation clearly:

you lost access due to 2FA
created a new account
the old account had already claimed student benefits

Ask them if they can either transfer eligibility or reset it for your new account. In cases like this, manual intervention is usually required — there’s no self-service way to fix it.

[kriikx]

You’re running into a common GitHub Student Pack restriction: once an email has been used to claim student benefits on an account, GitHub often keeps that eligibility tied to the original activation record, even if the email is later unlinked. There isn’t a guaranteed “instant reset” or manual switch between accounts. In most cases, you need to either recover access to the original account (via GitHub Support using 2FA recovery flow) or contact GitHub Education Support and clearly explain that the original account is inaccessible due to lost 2FA. They can sometimes manually review and re-verify your eligibility, but this is handled case-by-case. There is usually no simple waiting period that automatically frees the benefits; it depends on backend eligibility status. The most effective move is to open a support ticket through GitHub Support → Education and provide proof of student status plus details of both accounts, asking them to unlink or reset the prior activation so you can reapply on your new account.