Can I control how long Benecaster keeps analytics history?
Yes, and Benecaster uses two separate retention systems depending on what’s being stored.
Analytics data (Settings → Tools → Analytics Data) — controls download proxy records, subscriber lifecycle events, and daily analytics snapshots. The default is Forever — nothing is deleted until you set a window or use “Prune now” manually. Options: Forever, 5 years, 2 years, 1 year, or a custom number of months. The subscriber events and snapshots stay small even over many years; download proxy records are the one that grows meaningfully at scale.
Two things worth knowing about retention windows: First, pruning is permanent — any records outside your chosen window are deleted during the nightly purge and cannot be recovered. If you later want longer-term charts, the history that was pruned won’t be there. Second, many hosts cap database and disk size, so keeping everything forever can push you toward those limits on busy shows. The download proxy log is the one that grows meaningfully; subscriber events and daily snapshots stay small. If you’re on a host with tight storage limits, setting a 1–2 year window on the download proxy records is a reasonable middle ground.
Feed request log (Settings → GDPR / Privacy) — a separate, higher-volume data set. Every feed access request is logged with a status (valid subscriber, revoked token, unrecognized token, or over-limit) along with a timestamp, hashed IP, and country/region. Because this is a per-request log, it can grow quickly on active shows. The default retention is 30 days, and Benecaster purges it automatically each night — no action required on your part. You can shorten or lengthen the window, or disable logging entirely, from the GDPR / Privacy settings panel.
The raw feed request log is kept deliberately short-lived. Each night, Benecaster purges rows older than your configured window. Separately, the daily analytics snapshots (governed by the Analytics Data retention above) accumulate pre-aggregated summaries from the raw log — those are what power longer-term analytics charts and stay compact regardless of traffic volume. Once the raw rows have been summarized into the daily snapshot, they don’t need to be kept long-term.