How to deactivate Photoshop Elements

You open the Editor on your old PC and on the menu bar click Help à Deactivate

If that doesn’t work you need to contact support at the link below. Click I need help with deactivation and it’s often possible to initiate live chat.

http://www.adobe.com/aboutadobe/contact.html

When you'll go to Editor's Help -> Deactivate..., you'll see a window like

Click on "Deactivate Permanently". It will deactivate your serial number on that machine and you can use that serial number on some other machine.

You are looking in editor and not organizer? Do you keep getting a screen asking you to enter your serial number, by any chance?

Yes, you can't deactivate while working on a photo. That's so you don't lose your work.

Actually that doesn't make much sense. Deactivate means "I will never use this program again on this computer", so you can't deactivate unless PSE perceives you're not busy doing something. Obviously you won't deactivate while you're working. Launch the editor then immediately go to Help>Deactivate and that's all it should take.

Deactivating has no effect on your pictures or on organizer. It only affects editor. Even so, I would wait till you have completed your organizer backup and are sure you are through with PSE before deactivating it.

It would be helpful to add that the Editor to which you refer is Adobe Photoshop/Elements Editor. It took me about 10 minutes of searching to figure that out.

The answer may be very helpful, because Adobe instructions do not specify how to use the Editor to deactivate. In fact, I followed a set of Adobe instructions (source?, don't remember right now) and only uninstalled the program - PE13. That didn't help with getting the number of installations reduced in my Adobe account.

Follow on:  In PE13 Editor, I went to Help, then to Sign Off. There was no "Deactivate" anywhere, but Signing Off was supposed to deactivate that registered copy.

It did not, at least as far as removing 1 of the 2 PE13 installations that show up when I go to my Adobe account.

Still trying to get  hold of an Adobe human to help.

For help with activation, you don't want regular customer support, but rather activation support. You  need to contact them from this page:

Activation & deactivation help

Added to my other replies to Barbara B.:

I have tried the A & D help page several times and find that it leads to nothing. It will not lead to a chat source after asking for "more information."

I did stumble across a chat window, but every time I tried it, it apologized for "not being available now."

I followed Adobe Care to a Twitter page that did not lead to a source of a real chat technician, or any other source of changing the registered products in my account.

Is Adobe so paranoid that someone will use their products without paying that they make it almost impossible for a valid registered user to communicate with them?

Still trying.

You can go to the Activation & deactivation help all you want, wait at each page as long as you want, and there will be no response from Adobe. You will not find a chat icon that works, a contact us box that works, or any other help for Photoshop Elements. If you dial an Adobe phone number, eventually you will be told that Adobe provides no phone support for PE.

I have installed and tried to deactivate PE13 on my PC at least 4 times now. Any Adobe "help" page you find will not have the correct information, at least for PE13 deactivation.

I think it's time to go to a hack site to get a code that will work on my Mini.

Must find some solution before I start destroying hardware in frustration.

I don't know where Correct Answer came from, but it does not help getting PE deactivated. If somehow you go to

the PE Help on the PE13 menu bar, you will not see "Deactivate" you will see a Sign Out choice. That tells you, on

a PC to go to Control Panel and Unistall the program. You will be given one choice about saving or deleting preferences,

but no other choice. There is a series of screen shots on one of the Adobe "help" pages that shows more options for

permanently removing the program from your current installation. I've gone through that 4 times now and nothing shows

on my Adobe account under My Products. There are 2 registrations on Mar 6, 2015. I only registered the program on one

machine, my PC, so why are there 2 registrations showing?

Even the Geek Squad has only online info that does not lead to an Adobe human chat site. Sob.

I have no trouble getting the active chat window, although it's a long slog to get there. Only activation support can fix this for you, so you will just have to persevere. Are you continuing even when it looks like you're getting looped back to a page you just left a couple of clicks ago? That's not really the same page--it just looks identical, for one of those mysterious adobe reasons, but if you fill in the info again and go on it does take you to someplace else.

Also, if you are using a program like Ghostery or another program that blocks trackers and such, you need to disable it  when you get the page that shows the chat option, or the actual chat window is blocked from appearing.