Scheduled Purge
Automatically delete files older than an age you set, for retention cleanup of stale exports, temporary files, and logs. It permanently deletes files — and is not a backup.
Last updated September 17, 2026
#What Scheduled Purge does
A Scheduled Purge is a job mode — chosen from the same list as Copy, Move, and Sync/Mirror — that deletes files older than a configured age from a single location, optionally limited to a file pattern, on a schedule. It's built for retention cleanup: stale exports, temporary or already-processed files, vendor drops, and old generated reports or logs.
Scheduled Purge permanently deletes matching files and is not a backup. Deleted files are gone unless you have a separate backup or archive. Treat it as housekeeping, never as a retention store.
#How it decides what to delete
A purge job has no destination. You configure:
- Target — one location (Local, SMB, SFTP, FTP, S3, or Azure Blob) and a folder or prefix inside it. Remote targets use a stored credential with list and delete rights.
- Age — “delete files older than” a number of days, weeks, months, or years. Files newer than the cutoff are never touched. (Months and years use calendar-aware math, so “1 month” isn't always 30 days.)
- Pattern — a file pattern such as
*.csvtargets specific files; the default*matches everything by age.
Both the age and the pattern must match for a file to be deleted.
#Built-in safety
FileAgent includes guardrails to reduce the chance of a damaging purge:
- It refuses to purge the bare root of a drive, share, bucket, or container — point the job at a folder inside the location.
- It never deletes files newer than your cutoff.
- If a file's age can't be determined, it is skipped rather than deleted (fail-safe).
- You can archive before delete, keeping a recoverable copy of what was purged (see Archive options).
#Preflight checklist before production
- Point the job at a specific folder/prefix, not a root.
- Start with a narrow pattern (for example
*.tmp), not the default*. - Confirm the age threshold against real files' modified times.
- Decide whether to archive before delete, or ensure a separate backup exists.
- Run it manually once and review the deleted and skipped counts in Logs.
- Only then enable the schedule.
#If it deletes too much or too little
See Scheduled Purge troubleshooting — the most common causes are a pattern that's broader or narrower than intended, an age threshold that's larger or smaller than you meant, or files that simply aren't old enough yet.