Submission storage

Storage on (the default)

Every submission is kept in SimplyForms, encrypted at rest with a key for your team. You can browse and search submissions in the dashboard, export them as CSV or JSON, and read them through the REST API. Each submission is also sent to your notification email, webhooks, integrations and autoresponse. How long submissions are kept depends on your plan.

Storage off: delivered, then deleted

With storage off, SimplyForms keeps nothing it does not need to deliver a submission. Each one is:

1. checked as usual: CAPTCHA, spam rules, allowed domains and your plan's limit;
2. held encrypted, with the same team key as stored submissions, while it is sent to your notification email, webhooks, integrations and autoresponse;
3. deleted as soon as every destination has it.

If a destination is down, SimplyForms keeps retrying: the notification email after 1, 5 and 15 minutes, then at growing intervals of up to a day; webhooks on their usual retry schedule. A submission is never held for more than 72 hours. If a destination is still failing then, the submission is deleted anyway and that destination never receives it.

What changes when storage is off

• New submissions do not appear in the dashboard, exports or the API. The Submissions tab shows how many arrived, and submissions still count towards your monthly limit.
• The notification email is your record. It says so at the bottom. Values that look sensitive, such as card numbers and passwords, are hidden in the email and cannot be recovered.
• File uploads are refused with an error. Forms that send files need storage on.
• A webhook's payload is deleted once it has been delivered. A failed delivery can be replayed until the 72 hours are up, but not after.
• A submission flagged by one of your spam rules is only emailed to you, with "[Possible spam]" in the subject. It is not sent to webhooks, integrations or the autoresponse.

Want a full copy in your own systems? Add a webhook: it receives every field of every submission.

Turn storage on or off

Open the form's Settings tab and use Store submissions in SimplyForms. It is available on every plan and is set per form.

• Turning storage off does not delete submissions that are already stored. You can tick a box to delete them at the same time, or delete them later from the Danger Zone.
• Turning storage back on only affects new submissions. Anything received while it was off has already been deleted.

Copies SimplyForms does not control

Deleted by SimplyForms does not mean no copy exists anywhere:

• Your destinations keep what they receive: your inbox, your webhook receiver and your integrations.
• Our email provider keeps a copy of each notification email for 30 days. See the sub-processors page.
• A submission held during a daily database backup stays in that backup, encrypted, until the backup rolls off after 7 days.

See the privacy policy for every retention period.