Synopsis

Panopto videos in course and personal folders are deleted after they go four years without being watched.

Background

In 2020, we direly needed a fully featured video solution as all classes were held online due to the COVID-19 pandemic. When we purchased Panopto, it was an unlimited storage system. We originally used a Zoom integration to automatically back up Zoom recordings to users' personal folders. This integration accumulated a large quantity of videos. In Fall 2022, Panopto changed their licensing to add storage quotas. CCA was over our quota and forced to purchase additional "archived" hours in order to keep all videos. The impact of this licensing change was described on the page Panopto Storage & Zoom Changes (Fall 2022).

Data analysis later determined that over 80% of Zoom recordings in Panopto were never watched. It is likely many users were unaware their meetings were backed up and never intended to use the recordings. As we look to manage CCA's technology costs, being able to remove unneeded videos allows us to stop purchasing additional archived hours.

In Fall 2025, we officially changed our Panopto content retention policy to delete videos which had not been viewed once in the past four years. This four-year period is consistent with other CCA policies, such as the Moodle Retention Policy.

Once per quarter, Panopto's content retention feature analyzes CCA's videos. Videos are deleted permanently if:

• They have not been watched once in the past four years
• They are in a course or personal folder
  • Their top-level parent folder will be named either Moodle or Users

Deletion occurs whether the video is in an archived or ready-to-watch state. The content retention process is automated and does not involve intervention on a system administrator's part.

Video creators will not receive an email notification if their video will be deleted. This is an outstanding feature request for the Panopto platform which we have made clear is a high priority for us.

These policy only applies to videos in Moodle course folders or Users personal folders. Videos under other parts of the Panopto folder hierarchy, such as CCA Departments or Library, will be retained indefinitely. Some videos retained indefinitely may be kept in an archived state. You can view a video's parent folder in Panopto using the Browse button in the main menu on the left.

Frequently Asked Questions

When is the first round of video deletions?

Video viewing statistics will be analyzed on October 28, 2025 and videos will be subsequently deleted starting November 2nd, 2025.

What do I do if I want to save a video?

Watch it. Watching a video even once will exempt it from the retention policy. Please give yourself enough time to watch your video before the October 28 deadline and note that archived videos take approximately 48 hours to be restored. If you have an archived video you want to keep, it would be best to restore it before October 26th and watch it immediately upon restoration.

Are there alternative places to store my videos?

Yes. Here are a few alternatives and their tradeoffs.

YouTube offers unlimited storage. YouTube is not accessible in China and does not have granular sharing settings. YouTube videos can be embedded in Moodle easily, but there is no integration like Panopto.

All CCA users have a Google Drive account with limited storage. Drive does not have a nice video player, so it is best for simply storing videos and not a good way to distribute them to be watched by others.

Any other personal storage device would also work, such as an external hard drive or other cloud storage service (Dropbox, OneDrive, iCloud). However, if you are a CCA staff or faculty member, you should not store FERPA-protected data (e.g. class recordings) on a personal storage device.

Is a deleted video available anywhere?

No. Videos are deleted immediately. There is no temporary recycling bin nor backups.

Is my video deleted if it is more than four years old?

Not necessarily. Video age is not the determining factor, instead that is when a video was last watched. Older videos which are reused and watched each term will not be deleted.