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Note: Box Archive is available only for Enterprise Advanced accounts. Your organization must be entitled to Box Archive to create and use archives.
Box Archive lets admins work in Content Manager to create archives that live outside your organization’s main Box environment. You can move files and folders into an Archive for long-term preservation, search what you have archived, restore content back to active storage when appropriate, and delete Archives when you no longer need them—so you can support retention, compliance, and cleanup without losing control of important content.

What you can do with Box Archive

With Box Archive you can:
  • Create archives and move Box files and folders into them when content should leave day-to-day collaboration spaces but stay under your governance.
  • Configure access so the right co-admins and roles can manage archives alongside your main deployment.
  • View and search archived content when you need to locate or audit material.
  • Restore archived content to your main environment or delete archives when policy allows.
Box Archive can help your organization reduce clutter and redundant or outdated content, support multi-phased retention strategies, manage long-term compliant storage, reduce legal exposure of long-lived content, and keep important long-lived content in a dedicated archival context.

Example use cases

ScenarioHow Box Archive helpsWhere to start
Retention and complianceKeep long-term copies separate from active workspaces while staying able to search and report on what is archived.
Operational cleanupMove stale or low-touch content out of folders people use every day without destroying the record.
Lifecycle and recoveryBring content back when it is needed again, or remove archives when your process says they can go.
Account and plan changesKnow how archives behave if your subscription or account situation changes.

Getting started for admins

Use this sequence when you first enable Box Archive for your organization.
1

Control who can use archives

Use Configuring access to archives so the right admins and co-admins can create and work with archives.
2

Create archives and move content

Follow Archiving files and folders to set up archives and move Box content into them.
3

Find what you archived

Use Viewing and searching archives to locate and review archived items.
4

Restore or delete when appropriate

When content should return to active storage—or an archive should be removed—use Restoring archived content and deleting archives.
5

Review reporting

See Understanding Archive reporting for how reporting applies to your Archives.
6

Plan for edge cases

Read Known Archive limitations and Understanding Archives in downgraded accounts before you rely on Archives in unusual plan or migration scenarios.

Using Box Archive

Day-to-day archive management happens in the Admin Console through Content Manager. If you are not an admin or co-admin with archive access, ask your IT or Box admin to assign access. If you do have permission to work with archives:
1

Locate archived content

2

Restore or clean up

For who may use archives, see Configuring access to archives.

Next steps

Go deeper with these topics:

Configuring Access to Archives

Archiving Files and Folders

Viewing and Searching Archives

Restoring Archived Content and Deleting Archives

Understanding Archives in Downgraded Accounts

Understanding Archive Reporting

Known Archive Limitations


Box Archive product page Troubleshooting & FAQs