Create Retention Policies in Microsoft 365

In this post, we will learn how to create retention policies in Microsoft 365 using the compliance center.

Last week we learned about the security tools and services Microsoft gives us out of the box, and today we will focus on retention policies.

Retention Policy

Before we jump and create a retention policy, let’s cover what a retention policy is. In Microsoft 365 a retention policy allows us to keep deleted and non delete resources and decide for how long to keep the data for. A resource can be, emails, MS Teams messages, SharePoint sites and Teams channels.

The above point is important because if you configure the wrong setting you can delete data that the users are still using and was not deleted.

Create a Retention Policy

To create a retention policy. open the Microsoft 365 compliance center and click on Information governance and select retention policies. You can use the direct link below.

https://compliance.microsoft.com/informationgovernance?viewid=retention

To create a policy, click on New retention policy set a name and click next. In the Choose locations to apply the policy select the locations. By default Exchange, SharePoint, OneDrive and OneDrive are all selected.

The final stage is to decide for how long you would like to retain the data for. The default period is 7 years but you can change it using the custom option or keep your data forever.

My recommendation to you is to test the polices first on a small group of users and do not select all users. also make sure the period is not too sure.


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