Slack has become an indispensable communication and collaboration tool for teams and organizations. With numerous conversations happening across public and private channels, there is often a need to declutter and organize channels once projects are completed or teams disbanded.
Slack provides the ability to archive channels while retaining message history for future reference. However, finding and accessing these archived channels is not always intuitive. This guide will provide step-by-step instructions on how to recover and view archived Slack channels.
Table of Contents
Why Archive Slack Channels
Here are some key reasons for archiving Slack channels:
- Free up space: Archived channels remove clutter from the channel list while still keeping valuable conversations accessible. This helps focus on active discussions.
- Preserve history: All previous messages, files, and other data remain searchable even when a channel is archived. This creates an archive of project or team discussions.
- Revisit conversations: Archived channels can be unarchived in the future if there is a need to revisit conversations or reference material.
- Comply with regulations: Archived Slack data may need to be retained to meet legal or compliance requirements. Archiving provides long-term preservation.
How to Find Archived Slack Channels
Slack archives channels by removing them from the active channel list. However, archived channels remain visible and accessible. Here are the steps to view archived channels:
On Desktop
- Click on the channel browser icon on the left sidebar
- Click on “Show” and select “Archived Channels” from the dropdown menu
- Browse the list of archived channels
On Mobile
- Tap on the workspace name on the top bar
- Select “Browse channels” option
- Tap on “Archived channels” to only show archived conversations
The archived channels will be displayed with “(archived)” appended to the channel name. This indicates the channel has been removed from active view but contents remain available.
How to Unarchive a Slack Channel
To restore an archived Slack channel:
On Desktop
- Follow the steps above to view archived channels
- Click on the channel you want to unarchive
- Click on the info icon next to channel name
- Select “Unarchive #channel-name” option
On Mobile
- Find the archived channel from the list
- Tap on the circled “i” icon next to channel name
- Choose “Unarchive #channel-name” to restore
Unarchiving brings back the channel to active view along with its members and full history. The channel can always be archived again if needed.
Searching Archived Channel Contents
The entire history of an archived channel remains searchable. To lookup conversations:
- Use the search bar at the top of Slack
- Specify search terms along with “in:#channel-name”
- Results from archived channel will be displayed
Advanced search operators can further filter results by date ranges, specific users, content types and more.
Slack Data Retention Policies
- Free Slack plan retains complete message history for 10,000 most recent messages
- On Plus/Standard plans, message history is available for unlimited messages
- Deleted channels are permanently erased, including message history
- Archived channels retain history until manually deleted
Enterprise Grid plans provide additional data control with customizable retention policies and exports.
Best Practices for Channel Archiving
Here are some tips for effectively managing and utilizing Slack’s archiving capabilities:
- Archive channels in bulk to reduce clutter
- Standardize channel naming conventions for easy searchability
- Pin important messages before archiving a channel
- Unarchive channels instead of creating duplicates
- Search archived channels before starting new discussions
- Export data from critical channels for separate backup
- Establish channel archiving policies to meet data retention needs
Key Takeaways
- Archived Slack channels remove clutter while retaining searchable message history
- Archived channels can be easily recovered using filter options
- Entire Slack workspace remains searchable including archived data
- Custom retention policies and exports available on Enterprise Grid plan
- Archiving, when done effectively, makes conversations manageable and discoverable
Using Slack’s archiving features responsibly creates a valuable archive and reference resource for teams. Organizations can optimize these capabilities to strike the right balance between information discovery and knowledge preservation.
