Send Lifespan

Unlike regular vault items and file attachments, Sends are ephemeral and have a default lifespan of seven daysand can be set to last for up to 30 days using the deletion date option. When a Send reaches its deletion date, it's purged from Bitwarden systems and inaccessible to the sender and recipients.

Different client apps allow you to set additional limitations on access, like an expiration date and/or maximum access count options. You can also manually deactivate or delete a Send at any time.

Deletion date

By default, Sends will automatically be deleted seven days after they are created. Using the deletion date option, you can change this to a range of pre-specified options (for example, 1 hour, 1 day, 14 days, 31 days).

Deletion date has a maximum allowed value of 31 days from creation.

Deletion behavior

When a Send reaches its deletion date:

  • For recipients (anyone with the generated link), navigating to the Send link will show a screen reporting that the Send does not exist or is no longer available.
  • For the sender, a 🗑️ Pending Deletion icon will appear next to the Send. The Send will pend deletion for a few minutes, after which it will be permanently deleted from Bitwarden systems and from the sender's view.

[!NOTE] Sends have no soft delete. Deleted Sends are not sent to or stored in the trash. Once the deletion has been confirmed, you will not be able to access the contents of a Send.

Expiration date

[!NOTE] Expiration & disable options Only available in the web app and desktop app.

By default, Sends will never expire, but they will be deleted. Using the Expiration Date option, you can select from a range of pre-specified options (for example, 1 hour, 1 day, 7 days) or specify a custom timestamp using the date picker (or in the text input in the format MM/DD/YYYY HH:MM AM/PM).

Expiration behavior

When a Send reaches its expiration date:

  • For recipients (anyone with the generated link), navigating to the Send link will show a screen reporting that the Send does not exist or is no longer available.
  • For the sender, an 🕐 Expired icon will appear next to the Send. The Send will remain accessible to the sender until the specified deletion date is reached.

Limit views (or, Maximum access count)

For all Sends, a current view count ticker will track the number of times the Send link has been accessed:

Current Access Count ticker *Current Access Count ticker *

You may specify a view limit using the Limit views field.

Maximum access count behavior

When a Send reaches its specified maximum access (or View) count:

  • For recipients (anyone with the generated link), navigating to the Send link will show a screen reporting that the Send does not exist or is no longer available.
  • For the sender, a ✗ Max access count reached icon will appear next to the send. The Send will remain accessible to its sender until the specified deletion date is reached.

[!TIP] Max Access Count The Current Access Count (or View) ticker counts:

  • For text Sends, the number of times the link has been accessed.
  • For file Sends, the number of times the contents are downloaded.
  • For shared item Sends, the number of times the link has been accessed.

Manually deactivate or delete

To manually deactivate or delete a Send from any Bitwarden app:

Web app

Delete from the web app

To delete a Send from the web app, use the ⋮ options menu to select the 🗑️ Delete button:

Send options Send options

Browser extension

Delete from browser extensions

To delete a Send from a browser extension, select the 🗑️ Trash icon next to the Send you want to delete:

Delete Send from a browser extension *Delete Send from a browser extension *

Desktop

Delete from desktop apps

To delete a Send from the desktop app, use the ⋮ options menu to select the 🗑️ Delete button:

Send options on desktop Send options on desktop

Mobile

Delete from mobile apps

To delete a Send from a mobile app, tap the ⋯ options menu and tap the Delete option:

Delete a send on mobile Delete a send on mobile

CLI

Disable from the CLI

To disable a Send from the CLI, you will need to use the edit command to change the "disabled":false key-value pair to "disabled":true, for example:

bw send get <id> | jq '.disabled=false' | bw encode | bw send edit

We recommend reading the Send from CLI article for more information.

Delete from the CLI

To delete a Send from the CLI, use the delete command with the Send's exact unique id as an argument:

bw send delete <id>