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Deleting a space permanently removes the space and all of its contents.

Warning

Use caution while deleting a space, and always create an XML Space Backup before proceeding. Once deleted, there is no way to restore a space unless you have made an XML Space Backup.

You need to be a space administrator to delete a space.

To delete a space:

  1. Choose Browse > Space Admin.
    (info) Space Admin is displayed only if you are a space administrator for that space or you are a Confluence system administrator.

  2. Click Remove Space in the left panel under the heading 'Space Operations'.
  3. Click OK to confirm.

Working with spaces
Setting up a New Global Space
Viewing All Confluence Spaces
Browsing a space
Moving a Page
Copying or Renaming a Space

Take me back to Confluence User's Guide

19 Comments

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  1. Feb 05, 2009

    Anonymous

    Hello,

    does confluence offer a possibility to delete the complete content in a space without deleting the space container itself. I have a space, where I want to start from the scratch and I don't want to delete the space.

    Regards, Marc.

    1. Feb 05, 2009

      Azwandi Mohd Aris [Atlassian]

      Hi Marc,

      I am sorry that this feature is not available in Confluence. However, if you need to come up with a 'template' space, I have a suggestion for you:

      1. Create a space that will be the 'template' space
      2. Whenever you need to create another space based upon the 'template' space, copy the 'template' space

      Hope that helps.

      Cheers,
      Azwandi

  2. Apr 02, 2009

    Marten Vanderheiden

    Is there a way to remove the ability for Space Admins to delete their space and have this delegated to the Administrators group?

    1. Apr 07, 2009

      Zed Yap [Atlassian]

      Hi Marten

      As far as I know, the feature requested is not available yet. I found an improvement request in JIRA, I think this might be the closest to your requirement:

      Feel free to add your comment, vote for it and add yourself as watcher for future updates. Also, please bear
      in mind the following document on how we schedule features for inclusion in our products: Implementation of New Features and Improvements.

      Hope that helps.
      Best rgds,
      Zed

      1. Apr 07, 2009

        Marten Vanderheiden

        Thanks. I'll go and see about voting up that enchancement request. In the meantime a coworker was able to modify the spaceadminpanel.vmd file on our server to remove the ability of anybody but a Administrator to delete a space.

        Probably not the best solution because it isn't upgradable after that because the file will probably get overwritten but it'll do for now.

  3. Apr 27, 2010

    Jonas Bygdén

    Is there a way to purge deleted spaces?

    I deleted two test-spaces yesterday, but they still show up on the Dashboard and if I click them I get to a page that says:

    And the restore option.

    How do I delete it completely?

    1. May 12, 2010

      Husein Alatas [Atlassian]

      Hi Jonas,

      I am afraid you have mistaken in deleting the page rather than deleting the space itself.

      Deleting a space permanently removes the space and all of its contents while deleted pages are stored in the trash and can be restored by a space administrator.

      Hope that clarifies (smile)

      Cheers,
      Husein

      1. Oct 10, 2011

        Daniel Baktiar

        Hi Husein,

        Yes, I bumped into the same confusion with Jonas.

        I managed to delete some spaces, earlier. Yet I also made some mistakes just deleting the "Home" page.

        I think it's just not intuitive (usability issue) when you mistakenly deleted the "Home" page, the page just won't show up in the "Space Admin" and I can't find any way to delete the space unless I restore the "Home". Only then I can find the "Remove Space" button.

        CMIIW.

        Daniel

  4. Jun 10, 2010

    Anonymous

    If I delete a space is will the files attached to the pages also be deleated?

    Thanks in advance for your answer.

    Marion Bonleitner

    1. Jul 21, 2010

      Joachim Ooi [Atlassian]

      Yes, all the attachments in the pages of your space will be deleted as well.

      One way to save your attachments before you proceed with the space deletion is to perform a space backup - http://confluence.atlassian.com/display/DOC/Space+Backup+and+Restore

  5. Oct 19, 2010

    Anonymous

    Is there a way to delete a corrupted space?  I've unfortunately found myself in an awkward situation where the space is so badly foo-barred that any page in the space shows only a java exception stack trace I can't change the theme that originally caused the stack trace.

    (There is a plug-in bug that I'm working around, thus the logical "change the theme" option is not available.)

    1. Jan 14, 2011

      Anonymous

      This little trick permits to delete a space wich was badly installed and which is impossible to remove the usual way.
      1. be sure to know the "Key" of the space you want to remove, for this exemple we will use "HRE"
      2. go to ANOTHER space (doesn' matter wich one, but for security choose a fake one), in the admin space section and click on the remove space button
      3. you should have a form with a warning saying that the changes can't be undone and two buttons(OK-Cancel)
      4. With firebug or something equivalent, edit the page to change the form action like this : (yeah, put the key from the space you wanna remove)

      <form method="post" action="doremovespace.action?key=HRE" name="removespaceform">

      and now, click ok. That should do the trick.

  6. Nov 03, 2011

    Anonymous

    Hi, 

    I'm a confluence administrator and still cannot access the Space Administration section. 

    I wand to delete spaces in my wiki.

    Thanks

  7. Nov 03, 2011

    Anonymous

    hyetriaOk, I just got it.  you need to be in a specific space in order to access the Space Admin (as opposed to the home/dashboard page).

    1. Feb 03, 2012

      Anonymous

      Thanks for this hint. I was facing the same issue and could not figure out how come that I cannot see space admin as a confluence admin. Cheers to you mate.

  8. Nov 07, 2011

    Anonymous

    Hello,

    I do not see browse --> space admin as an option on the hosted confluence solution. How do I delete a space on the hosted solution ?

     

    Thanks

  9. Nov 17, 2011

    Anonymous

    I also do not have a Browse>Space Admin option available.

    Specs

    Confluence 4.0 evaluation version (Download version, not onDemand)

    RefinedWiki Original Theme 3.0 evaluation version.

     

    I saw one bug related to this which mentioned something about Crowd, but it wasn't about 4.0 (and I didn't even have the file it said to edit).

    -Jeremy Seely

  10. Nov 19, 2011

    Anonymous

    Hi,

    How is the Space Admin designated for each space? My account has been set to administrator, and I created the space, but I still don't have the menue item for removing it, so am assuming I'm not the Space Admin.

    Thanks!

    Nevin

  11. Nov 29, 2011

    Anonymous

    I too fell for the trap of deleting the main page of a space and had to spend hours fixing it.  I was able to do this by going into the database table CONTENT and finding my space with a contenttype of "PAGE" and TITLE "Home".  I then changed the column CONTENT_STATUS from "deleted" to "current".  This allowed me to get back into the space and follow the directions above.