License editions: To understand the applicable license editions, see Plans & Pricing.
Overview
You can always preserve users, that you had earlier activated in Endpoints or SaaS Apps.
Considerations:
When you mark the user as preserved:
the state of the user is marked as preserved
preserve license of the respective workload will be consumed only if that workload is backed up. For more information about the preserve license, see preserve license consumption rationale.
By default, 10% of the active workload license is allocated as a preserve workload license. For example, if 1000 active workload licenses are allocated, then 100 free preserve workload licenses will be allocated to the user. To purchase additional preserve licenses, you must either contact Sales or delete already preserved users to accommodate other preserved users.
You will receive an email when you have reached 100% of your total preserve license count.
For a Business license edition customer of SaaS Apps, preserve license rationale is not applicable. If you preserve a SaaS Apps business edition customer:
the preserve license will not be consumed.
an active license will continue to be consumed.
How to preserve users?
You can preserve active users either from the top navigation menu bar or use Preserve a user API to automate the preservation of users.
To preserve a user:
From the Endpoints/ Microsoft 365/ Google Workspace dashboard, click Users on the top navigation menu bar.
Search and select the checkbox beside the active users that you want to preserve. Active users can be identified by the Image icon beside the user name.
To preserve multiple users, select the required checkboxes next to the users you want to preserve.Click the ellipsis button and click Preserve. You can also preserve a user from the User Details UI.
A confirmation window appears. Click Preserve.
A License Change Summary window appears that displays all the license changes for the selected user. Click Done to close the window.
The selected user(s) will be preserved and the user status is changed to Preserved. You can view the user status and the license state on the User details page.
After preserving the user:
The state of the user is marked as preserved, but the preserve license of the respective workload will be consumed only if that workload is backed up. For more information about the preserve license, see preserve license consumption rationale.
All user devices are disabled, backups are stopped, and the user cannot backup data anymore.
Endpoints and SaaS Apps retain the user's backed up data as per the defined Backup Retention Policy and the user data that falls out of the defined retention period gets deleted automatically. Hence, if you want to preserve data for a user, you must put that user on Legal Hold.
If not activated again, the preserved user is later deleted after the duration specified in the Auto-Delete Preserved User settings of the user's profile.
If a user in a Preserved state has backed up the data at least once, the snapshot for the backed-up data will appear on the console. This snapshot remains till the user is present in the Druva console irrespective of the retention policy.
In Microsoft 365 backups, how do I remove users from the Preserved state?
There are two different meanings of "removing" a preserved user — reactivating them back to active status, or permanently deleting them. Here's how to do each in the Microsoft 365 module:
Option 1: Reactivate a Preserved User (Back to Active)
If you want to move a user out of the Preserved state and resume backups:
From the Microsoft 365 dashboard, click Users on the top navigation menu.
Select the checkbox beside the preserved user(s) you want to activate.
Click the ⋮ (ellipsis) button and click Activate.
On the confirmation window, click Activate.
On the License Change Summary window, review the license changes and click Done.
Note: After activation, it takes up to 30 minutes before manual backup, scheduled backup, restore, and sync operations resume.
Option 2: Remove the Preserved License / Permanently Delete the User
If you want to fully remove a preserved user and free up the license:
Go to the Microsoft 365 dashboard.
Click Users in the top navigation.
Select the checkbox next to the user with the preserved license.
Click the ⋮ (ellipsis) menu.
Choose Remove License.
Select the workload(s) for which you want to remove the license.
Click Remove License, then Done in the summary window.
⚠️ Important — this is irreversible:
Removing the license permanently deletes the backed-up data and snapshots for that user in Druva.
The license (active or preserved) is freed up after removal.
If the user's profile has Data Lock enabled, you cannot remove the license.
Things That Can Block Deletion/Removal
A preserved user won't be deleted (even via an auto-delete policy) if:
They're under Legal Hold.
They have shared data with guest users who still have access.
They have an active Shared/Resource Mailbox still being backed up (you must delete that mailbox from O365 or manually delete the user in Druva first).
Data Lock is enabled on their profile — this takes precedence over both "Auto-Delete Preserved Users" and license removal, blocking any deletion entirely.
Alternative: Automatic Cleanup via Profile Setting
Instead of manually removing users one at a time, you can configure Auto-Delete Preserved Users at the profile level so preserved users are automatically deleted after a set number of days:
From the Microsoft 365 console, select Profiles.
Select the relevant profile, click Edit → General.
Under Data Preservation & Alerts, enable Auto-delete preserved users.
Specify the number of days (min 30, max 7305 days) after which preserved users should be auto-deleted, then click Save.
Note: Once auto-deleted, that user's data is permanently gone and cannot be recovered.