Deleting contacts allows you to completely and permanently remove them and their information from your Brevo account.

🤔 Should I delete or blocklist contacts?

When deciding whether to delete or blocklist contacts, consider the following:

• Deleting a contact will remove all of their information stored on your Brevo account. This action is irreversible and all data will be permanently lost, including attributes, history, and other related information. Deleting contacts is only recommended for General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) compliance purposes, such as when a contact specifically requests that you delete their data.
• On the other hand, blocklisting contacts is reversible and does not delete any data. If you have unengaged or invalid contacts, we recommend that you blocklist them to keep their data and protect the quality of your campaigns.
  
  ❗️ Important

  We highly recommend that you do not delete blocklisted contacts. Keeping blocklisted contacts ensures that you cannot accidentally re-import and send campaigns to contacts that are found to be invalid or have previously opted out of your communications.

🗑️ Delete contacts

There are three ways to delete contacts. You can:

• Delete one or several contacts from the Contacts page,
• Delete a single contact from their details page, or
• Delete contacts automatically using the new automation editor.

Delete one or several contacts from the Contacts page

1. Go to Contacts.
2. Optional: Click Add filter to filter your contacts, for example, by language or creation date, or click Use segment template to use a pre-defined segment. You can also load a list or a segment if you've already created one.
   
3. Select the contacts that you want to delete:
   
   
   1. To select multiple individual contacts, select the checkboxes next to the contacts.
   2. To select all of the contacts on your current page, select the checkbox at the top left of the table.
   3. To select all of the contacts on your current list or database, select the checkbox at the top left of the table and click Select all contacts.
4. Click More actions > Delete permanently.
   
5. Enter the number of selected contacts to confirm.
   
6. Click Delete.

The contacts and their data have been permanently deleted from your Brevo account. From your notifications center, you can see who deleted the contacts, how, and using which IP address.

Delete a single contact from their details page

1. Go to Contacts.
2. Select a contact to open their details page.
3. Click the three-dot icon in the header > Delete permanently.
   
4. Click Yes, delete permanently to confirm.

The contact and their data have been permanently deleted from your Brevo account.

Delete contacts automatically using the new automation editor

You can automatically delete contacts using an automation if they meet certain criteria. For example, you may want to automatically delete contacts that have not interacted with you in a long time.

1. Go to Automations.
2. Click Create an automation.
3. Click Use the new editor [Beta].
4. Click the name of your automation in the top bar to update it.
5. Add a trigger. In our example, we added the trigger Contacts matches custom filters:
   1. From the Triggers tab, drag and drop the Contacts - Contact matches custom filters trigger into the canvas.
   2. Click Add filter on the Contacts filters card, click Add filter to specify what filters should trigger the automation. 
      
      ➡️  For example

      You can specify filters for contacts who haven't interacted with you in a while:

      • Email > Email not opened > Any type of email > In the last > 24 months.
      • Contact details > Engagement status > Unengaged.
        You can customize the criteria that define an unengaged contact from the Unengaged Contacts page.
   3. Click Add filters.
   4. Click Save.
6. From the Actions tab, select the Contacts - Delete a contact step into the canvas.
   
   💡 Good to know

   You cannot add any more steps after the Contacts - Delete a contact step.
7. Click Save.
8. In the top bar, click Activate automation.
9. Click Activate automation.

To learn more about the new automation editor, check our dedicated articles.

🤔 Have a question?

If you have a question, feel free to contact our support team by creating a ticket from your account. If you don't have an account yet, you can contact us here.

If you’re looking for help with a project using Brevo, we can match you with the right certified Brevo expert partner.