Enable setting to allow admins to permanently delete data

[Discourse]

This is a guide on how to enable the setting for administrators to permanently delete data on a Discourse instance.

Required user level: Admin

As of v2026.4.0 Changelog | Discourse Releases the site setting to allow admins to permanently delete data is no longer a hidden site setting.

To use this feature, enable the can permanently delete setting. However, please be aware of the risks involved with this feature — as the setting name suggests, if you permanently delete a topic, post, or post revisions, there is no way to restore this content. As such, there are a few safeguards in place:

Enabling permanent deletion via the admin dashboard

To enable the setting using the admin dashboard,

1. Go to Admin > Site Settings > Security
2. Search for can permanently delete
3. Tick the checkbox
   
   

Enabling permanent deletion via the Rails console

To enable the setting using the Rails console, execute the following commands:

1. Access your Discourse application directory:

cd /var/discourse

2. Enter the app container:

./launcher enter app

3. Access the Rails console:

rails c

4. Set the site setting can_permanently_delete to true:

SiteSetting.can_permanently_delete = true

5. Exit the Rails console:

exit

6. Exit the app container:

exit

This change takes effect immediately, and no further action is required.

Enabling permanent deletion via app.yml

Another way to enable permanent deletion is through the app.yml configuration file. Follow these steps:

1. Open the app.yml file located in your Discourse application directory.

2. Locate the env: section. You can find this under DISCOURSE_HOSTNAME.

3. Add the following line to enable permanent deletion:

   DISCOURSE_CAN_PERMANENTLY_DELETE: true
   

4. Save the changes and execute the following command to rebuild your app:

   ./launcher rebuild app
   

Your changes will take effect once the rebuild process is complete.

Last edited by @Moin 2026-05-14T03:04:10Z

Check document

Perform check on document:

[Bathinda (Bathinda Helper)]

“Delete Data” means all the topics, posts, uploads etc, everything will be deleted from our site and it’ll be just an empty new website?

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Or it’d delete ‘Data’ container or something?

[JammyDodger]

It refers to this feature - Introducing permanently delete post functionality

It allows admins to hard delete posts/topics when enabled, rather than the normal soft-delete without it.

[Moin]

@Discourse

As such, there are a few safeguards in place:

It feels like something is missing here. Maybe it’s the information about the extra step when enabling the setting or the extra safeguards when deleting a post (5-minute wait or another admin, and the confirmation text you need to enter).