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When you delete something in TimeTracker, it moves to Trash. Nothing is destroyed at that moment. You can put it back.

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What Trash is

Trash is a staging area between “delete” and “gone”. It exists because an accidental delete – especially a bulk one – has to be recoverable in a system that records time and money. A trashed item:
  • is hidden everywhere: lists, pickers, boards, search
  • keeps all of its data while it is in the Trash
  • shows the date it will be permanently deleted
  • can be restored by anyone with the right permission
  • is permanently deleted when the retention window ends

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How to delete something

1

Open the actions menu

Click the three-dot menu on the row, or the Actions button on the item’s page.
2

Choose Delete

A confirmation appears. It says what would eventually be destroyed, that nothing is destroyed yet, and where to find the item again.
3

Confirm

Click Delete. A toast confirms, for example “Task moved to Trash.”
Delete is reversible, so it is a plain confirmation. Delete permanently is not, so it asks you to type a matching name. See Delete permanently.

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How to restore something

1

Open Settings → Trash

It is under the Data group in the settings menu.
2

Find the item

Items are grouped by type, with a count on each group. Use Search by name to narrow it down.
3

Read the dates

Each row shows when it was deleted and when it will be permanently deleted, like “Deleted 12/06/2026 · deletes 12/07/2026”.
4

Click Restore

The item returns to your active lists immediately. Anything the delete took with it comes back too.
You can also restore from a list. Switch the scope filter from Active to Trash, then use the row’s actions menu. Opening a trashed item’s own page shows a banner with a Restore button.
Restoring gives back everything the delete took with it. Deleting a task takes its subtasks; restoring the task brings them back.

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Set how long items are kept

At the top of Settings → Trash is Keep deleted items for.
1

Open Settings → Trash

The retention card is above the list.
2

Pick a window

Choose from the dropdown.
3

Save

A Save button appears once you change the value. A toast confirms: “Deleted items are now kept for 60 days.”
This setting needs the workspace.updateSettings capability – owners and admins by default. Everyone else sees the current value but cannot change it. There is no single right answer. A team that deletes rarely wants a long window; a team with data-retention obligations may need a short one.

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What happens when the window ends

A nightly sweep permanently deletes trashed items whose window has elapsed. Two rules govern it:
  1. Anything still referenced by the financial or historical record is kept, not force-deleted. Time passing is not a reason to orphan an invoice line. Those items stay in the Trash.
  2. The sweep destroys exactly what a manual permanent delete would. A scheduled destruction and a hand-triggered one leave the workspace in the same shape.
So an item can sit in the Trash past its date. That means something still points at it. See Delete permanently for what blocks a purge and what to do about it.

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Example

Tom Whitfield deletes the wrong tag while tidying up Northwind Studio.
  1. He clicks Delete on the tag. The confirmation says “Nothing is destroyed yet – the tag is destroyed and removed from every task that carries it. You can restore it from Settings → Trash until it is permanently deleted.”
  2. The tag disappears from the tag picker and from every task.
  3. Two days later Priya asks where it went.
  4. Tom opens Settings → Trash, types “brand” in the search box, and finds the row: “Deleted 12/06/2026 · deletes 12/07/2026”.
  5. He clicks Restore. Every task that carried the tag has it back.

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Permissions

Deleting and restoring use the same permission that governs the item itself. Settings → Trash is visible to everyone, on purpose. It is a recovery screen, and it only offers Restore and Delete permanently on rows you are allowed to act on. Restoring is never blocked by a switched-off app. If Expenses is turned off, an expense in the Trash can still be restored – otherwise it would be stranded until an admin re-enabled a whole app.

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What happens next

  • A restored item is back in every list and picker straight away.
  • A restored item’s history was never lost, so nothing has to be re-entered.
  • An item left in the Trash is permanently deleted when its window ends, unless something still references it.

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Common questions

No. Delete moves an item to Trash. Delete permanently appears only for items already in the Trash, and cannot be undone.
As long as your retention window – 30 days by default, up to 90.
Yes. The window is measured from the date each item was deleted, against the current setting.
You can permanently delete items one at a time from Settings → Trash. Anything still referenced by the financial record is refused.
No. A trashed item is hidden everywhere until it is restored.
Something in the financial or historical record still points at it, so the sweep kept it rather than orphaning that record.
No. That is the one irreversible step.

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Troubleshooting

Delete permanently

The irreversible step, and what refuses it.

Archive something

Hide finished work instead of deleting it.

Your data

All four states in one place.

Archive, trash and delete

The concept behind the system.

Delete and restore a task

The task-specific walkthrough.

Roles and capabilities

Who can delete and restore what.