# what is the recommended retention period for the identity snapshot?

**URL:** <https://community.sailpoint.com/discuss/t/what-is-the-recommended-retention-period-for-the-identity-snapshot/59472>\
**Category:** Administration & Troubleshooting\
**Created:** [June 14, 2026, 12:58pm UTC](https://community.sailpoint.com/discuss/t/what-is-the-recommended-retention-period-for-the-identity-snapshot/59472 "2026-06-14T12:58:51Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Gheith](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/fbc32d/32.png) [@Gheith](https://community.sailpoint.com/discuss/u/Gheith)\
**Post date:** [June 14, 2026, 12:58pm UTC](https://community.sailpoint.com/discuss/t/what-is-the-recommended-retention-period-for-the-identity-snapshot/59472/1 "2026-06-14T12:58:51Z")

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#### what is the recommended retention period for the identity snapshot?

#### &nbsp;the value of “Days before snapshot deletion” of identities.

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**Author:** ![ed\_miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/sailpoint2/discuss/user_avatar/community.sailpoint.com/ed_miller/32/17615_2.png) [@ed\_miller](https://community.sailpoint.com/discuss/u/ed_miller)\
**Post date:** [June 15, 2026, 2:19am UTC](https://community.sailpoint.com/discuss/t/what-is-the-recommended-retention-period-for-the-identity-snapshot/59472/2 "2026-06-15T02:19:02Z")

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Short answer: 90 days

Longer answer…

**Default behavior:**

- Identity snapshots are created during certification generation and when the&nbsp; **“Maintain identity histories”** &nbsp;option is enabled in the Identity Refresh task.
- They store a copy of governance identity data for historical purposes, which can impact&nbsp; **database size, certification generation time, and UI rendering performance**.

**Best practice guidance:**

- SailPoint recommends setting the retention period to match your&nbsp; **certification archive policy**.
- This means keeping snapshots for as long as you need historical identity data for compliance, audit, or comparison purposes, but not longer than necessary to avoid unnecessary storage growth.
- If you keep live certification data for one or more complete certification cycles, you may want to retain snapshots for that same duration; older snapshots can be archived and deleted to improve performance and reduce disk space