Manage data retention policies for your team

With data retention, Dropbox Business admins can create policies that define how long content must be kept for in order to meet compliance and regulatory requirements. Even if a team member permanently deletes a file in the folder that is being retained, an admin can still download that file until the end of the policy duration. This way, teams will always have the files they’re required to keep, even if a team member deletes them.

Notes:

• You can have up to 100 active data retention policies.
• If a file is permanently deleted and then a new file is created with the exact same name, only the new file will be retained.

Create a data retention policy

To create a data retention policy:

1. Sign in to dropbox.com with your admin credentials.
2. Click Admin console.
3. Click Data governance.
4. Click Data retention.
5. Click New policy.
6. Fill out the name and details of the policy.
7. Add a retention period.
8. Click Add team folders to add the folders you’d like to include in the policy.
9. Click Create.
10. Click Create again to confirm.

You’ll receive an email within 24 hours confirming that the new policy is in place.

Download content included in the data retention policy

To download the content of a data retention policy:

1. Sign in to dropbox.com with your admin credentials.
2. Click Admin console.
3. Click Data governance.
4. Click Data retention.
5. Click the “…” (ellipsis) next to the policy you’d like to export.
6. Click Download content.
7. Add a name and note to your download.
8. Click Prepare.

Notes: 

• You can only download the latest version of a retained file.
• You can only download the contents of an active data retention policy. Once a policy is deleted you can no longer download the contents of that policy.

Edit a data retention policy

To edit a data retention policy:

1. Sign in to dropbox.com with your admin credentials.
2. Click Admin console.
3. Click Data governance.
4. Click Data retention.
5. Click the “…” (ellipses) next to the policy you’d like to edit.
6. Click Edit policy.
7. Edit the policy details you’d like to change.
8. Click Save, then click Save again in the window that appears.

Delete a data retention policy

To delete a data retention policy:

1. Sign in to dropbox.com with your admin credentials.
2. Click Admin console.
3. Click Data governance.
4. Click Data retention.
5. Click the “…” (ellipses) next to the policy you’d like to delete.
6. Click Delete policy.
7. Click Delete in the window that appears.