Blog · 2026-09-20 · Privacy · 3 min read
Why we delete your SMS after 24 hours
Messages are the most sensitive thing we could store. So we mostly don't. Here is exactly what is kept, for how long, and why.
Every SMS row in SMS Bridge is deleted 24 hours after it is created. Message bodies are blanked even sooner — 30 minutes after the message settles (sent, delivered, or failed). Delivery events, webhook payloads, and phone heartbeats follow the same 24-hour rule.
This is not just a policy promise; it is a background job in the API that runs every 30 minutes against the database.
What we keep
Contacts, templates, campaigns, phones, and API keys stay until you delete them. Aggregate counts (messages sent per day) are kept for analytics. Nothing that would let us reconstruct a conversation survives the day.
What this means for you
If you need a permanent record, forward messages to your own system via webhooks the moment they arrive. If you don't, you get a gateway that cannot leak what it does not have.