"Content older than one year will be deleted starting October 29th, 2026": what Slack's email actually means
Slack is emailing free workspaces a deletion date. Here is what gets deleted, why your date differs from everyone else's, how to check yours, and what to export before it passes.
If you got an email from Slack titled "Content older than one year will be deleted starting October 29th, 2026", it is genuine, it applies to your workspace, and the date in it is not the date in anyone else's.
Here is what it means, in the order the questions usually come.
The short version
- Your workspace is on the free Slack plan.
- From your workspace's date, messages and files older than one year are permanently deleted, on a rolling basis.
- Upgrading to a paid plan after content is deleted does not bring it back.
- The past 90 days stay visible on the free plan, as always. The band between 90 days and one year still exists but is hidden from view until you upgrade.
If you want to keep anything older than a year, you have two options: move to a paid Slack plan before the date, or export what matters and store it somewhere else.
Why your date is not October 29th for everyone
This is the part that causes the most confusion. People compare emails and see different dates, then assume one of them is a phishing attempt.
They are all real. Slack announced the policy in June 2024 and began applying it on 26 August 2024, but the deletion runs per workspace, on a rolling schedule. Different workspaces have been given different start dates, and you can find public examples of March 2026 and October 2026 dates from the same policy.
So: use the date in your own email or in your own workspace settings. Do not plan around a date you read in a forum post.
The underlying rule, which is the same for everyone, is documented by Slack in Usage limits for free workspaces and Customize data retention.
What exactly gets deleted
Everything counted as workspace content, once it crosses one year old:
- Channel messages, in public and private channels
- Direct messages and group DMs
- Files, images and snippets uploaded to Slack
- Canvases and other content stored in the workspace
Deletion is rolling, not a one-off sweep. After the start date, content keeps aging out continuously: a message posted today is deleted a year from today unless the workspace is on a paid plan by then.
What is not affected
- Paid workspaces. Pro, Business+ and Enterprise+ keep full history. The email does not apply to them.
- Anything under one year old. Still stored, though only the last 90 days are visible on the free plan.
- Your workspace itself. Nothing is being closed. Channels, members and settings stay.
How to check your own workspace in two minutes
- Sign in as an owner or admin.
- Open Settings & administration then Workspace settings.
- Find the Message and file retention section.
- Free workspaces show two choices: keep everything for one year, or delete after 90 days. That page is where your workspace's own behaviour is stated.
If you are not an owner, the person who created the workspace is, and they got the same email.
What to do before the date
If the history matters: export it
Slack's export tool is under Settings & administration then Workspace settings then Import/Export Data.
The important limitation: on the free plan, the standard export covers public channel messages and files. Private channels and DMs are not in it. Exporting those requires a paid plan and, depending on the export type, an approved request to Slack citing a legal or compliance basis. If your institutional memory lives in DMs, the honest answer is that a free-plan export will not capture it.
Do the export before your date. After deletion, the content is not in the export and not recoverable by upgrading.
If only some of it matters: harvest, do not archive
In most workspaces, the content worth keeping is a small fraction: decisions, credentials-adjacent process notes, onboarding explanations, the thread where you worked out why the deploy pipeline is the way it is.
A pragmatic pass, in an afternoon:
- Search for the five or six recurring topics your team asks about repeatedly.
- Copy the answers into wherever your durable documentation lives.
- Save the files you would miss.
- Let the rest go. It was going to be unfindable anyway.
If you want to keep everything: upgrade or move
Upgrading to Slack Pro is roughly $7.25 per user per month on annual billing, or $8.75 monthly. For ten people that is $870 a year to solve a retention problem. It is the fastest fix and, if your team is happy on Slack, a perfectly reasonable one.
Moving is more work and worth considering if the retention email is not your only complaint. Details in Slack alternatives in 2026.
The wider point about free tiers
The free plan is not a smaller paid plan. It is a demo with a clock on it, and this policy is the clock becoming visible. That is a legitimate business decision by Slack, and worth naming clearly, because teams plan as though free means permanent.
The same logic runs elsewhere. Jira is free up to 10 users, then roughly $95 a month at the eleventh hire. Notion, ClickUp and Monday all have thresholds where the free tier stops being viable, usually around history, guests or automations.
The thing to check for any tool holding your team's memory is not the price. It is what the free tier does with your data over time, and what you get back if you leave.
What we do differently
We build TeamLayer, so this is our pitch, kept short.
TeamLayer has no free plan, deliberately. There is a 7-day trial and then it is paid: $25 a month for a team of up to 10, $50 up to 20, then $2.50 per extra person with every 15th free. Prices are net.
What follows from that:
- Your history is not a lever. We are not funded by getting you to upgrade to read last year's messages, so nothing gets deleted for being old.
- Chat and tasks are in one app. Channels, DMs, threads, mentions, voice and video, plus tasks, sprints, kanban and a calendar, in the same database. That is one bill instead of two.
- A separate database per team, on your own subdomain.
If you are re-evaluating your stack because of a retention email, the question worth asking is not only "which chat tool", but "how many per-seat subscriptions am I paying for one team's work". For most teams under fifty people the answer is at least two.
FAQ
Is the Slack deletion email real?
Yes. Slack notifies free workspaces about the one-year deletion policy announced in June 2024 and applied from 26 August 2024. The date differs per workspace, so your email may say a different date from someone else's.
Will upgrading to a paid plan restore deleted Slack messages?
No. Slack states that content deleted under this policy cannot be recovered by upgrading afterwards. Upgrading before the deletion date preserves the history.
Does Slack delete messages newer than one year?
No. Content under one year old is retained. On the free plan only the last 90 days are visible and searchable, the rest is hidden but not deleted until it passes a year.
Can I export DMs from a free Slack workspace?
Not with the standard export. On the free plan the export covers public channels. Private channels and DMs require a paid plan and, for some export types, an approved request to Slack.
How do I find my workspace's deletion date?
Sign in as an owner or admin and open Settings and administration, then Workspace settings, then the message and file retention section. The date in your notification email refers to your workspace specifically.
What is the cheapest way to keep full chat history?
Either Slack Pro at roughly $7.25 per user per month on annual billing, or a tool that does not tie retention to the plan. TeamLayer keeps full history on every plan at $25 a month flat for up to 10 people, with tasks and sprints included.