Our Recent Team Activity feed and analytics tools, such as Recordings and Continuous Heatmaps, retain data for 365 days from the date of capture, while manual snapshot-based Heatmaps retain data for 365 days from the date of creation. This applies to all accounts and plans.
After 365 days, our automatic deletion process will begin. Data will be deleted from Hotjar servers, including backups, and cannot be retrieved. Deletion includes the entire report and not just the data collected.
User Attributes data works slightly differently. All user attributes for will be deleted once the associated users have not visited your site for a set period of time.
- Identified users (who have a user ID) will be deleted after 365 days assuming they have not visited your site since.
- Anonymous users (who do not have a user ID) will be deleted after 3 months.
Our Feedback tools, such as Incoming Feedback and Surveys retain data until manually removed by an Account Owner or Admin.
Data Retention Policy FAQs
Common questions about our data retention policy.
- What happens if I delete data collected?
- What happens if I delete my account?
- Do you have backups of my data?
What happens if I delete data collected?
Once you delete data collected by any of Hotjar’s tools, such as Heatmaps, Recordings, Surveys, etc., Hotjar starts an automated deletion process. This process takes up to 30 days in total and all data is hard deleted. As soon as you opt to delete the data, the process starts and the data is not retrievable.
What happens if I delete my account?
Once you delete a Site, Organization, or Account, Hotjar starts an automated deletion process. This process starts with a soft deletion which can take up to 7 days, from that point on, a hard deletion occurs and removes all of the data stored within your Site, Organization or Account. This process takes a total of 30 days to complete.
Do you have backups of my data?
After a completed cycle of the deletion process described above, all backups will have no trace of data you have collected, Site, Organization or Account information.