Can an AI notetaker auto-delete interview transcripts?

Some can, but none we checked deletes when a role is filled. Fellow, Fireflies, Otter, Granola, Tactiq and Ashby can delete recordings or transcripts after a set period, mostly on Enterprise plans. So set a period that covers your hiring cycle and any legal minimum, or delete by hand on the day the role closes.

Retention settings in AI notetakers run on a clock, not on your hiring pipeline. They count days from the meeting (or, in Tactiq's case, from the transcript's last edit) and delete when the period runs out. The notetaker does not know when a requisition closes. That lives in your ATS, and none of the help pages we read describes a link between the two.

That leaves two workable options. Set a period long enough to cover your longest hiring cycle plus any legal minimum, and accept that some data outlives the role. Or keep each role's interviews together and delete them by hand on the day the role is filled. You can also combine them: a long automatic backstop, and a manual delete at close.

Here is what each vendor's own help page says as of 22 October 2026. Most of these controls are Enterprise features, and some are set up by the vendor's team rather than in the app.

Three details matter more than the period itself. Scope: Granola deletes transcripts but keeps notes, Fellow never deletes AI notes before the recording they came from, and Otter warns that once a transcript is gone, its summary cannot be regenerated. Timing: Fireflies applies auto-delete only to future meetings, while Fellow deletes existing content that qualifies within an hour of saving, with no warning, and Granola's Enterprise policy deletes older transcripts as soon as it is activated. Grace windows: Tactiq keeps archived transcripts for 30 days before removing them for good.

Retention for interview data pulls in two directions. Privacy law tells you not to keep personal data longer than you need it. Employment law, especially in the US, tells you to keep hiring records for a minimum period. A good policy satisfies both, one data type at a time.

GDPR Article 5(1)(e) says personal data must be kept in identifiable form for no longer than necessary for the purpose. A candidate's interview recording, transcript and AI notes are personal data. Candidates can also ask for erasure under Article 17, and you must answer within one month, unless an exception applies, such as a legal obligation to keep the data.

France's data protection authority, the CNIL, gives concrete benchmarks in its recruitment guide: up to three months after the recruitment ends for an unsuccessful candidate, up to two years after the last contact for a talent pool (with consent, or clear notice and an easy way to object), and an evidence archive of up to five years after the decision. For audio or video of the interview, it says keeping it does not appear necessary without a specific justification, and it need not be kept beyond the hiring decision.

US federal law sets no general date by which you must delete interview data. It mostly sets floors. Employers covered by Title VII and the ADA must keep application forms and other records having to do with hiring for one year from the date the record was made or the personnel action, whichever is later (29 CFR 1602.14). The ADEA rule for applications is also one year (29 CFR 1627.3). Federal contractors with 150 or more employees and a contract of at least $150,000 must keep them for two years (41 CFR 60-1.12).

If a discrimination charge or lawsuit is filed, you must keep all relevant personnel records until it is finally resolved, and that can include records about other candidates for the same job. That is a legal hold, and it overrides any auto-delete schedule. Whether an AI transcript counts as a hiring record you must keep is a question for your counsel. One way to meet both goals is to keep the written evaluation for the required period and delete the raw recording sooner.

Use the date the role is filled (or closed without a hire) as the trigger, and give each data type its own clock. Treat this table as a starting point to adapt with your counsel, not as a rule.

If your notetaker has no schedule, or the schedule sits behind a plan you do not have, a manual routine works as long as it is written down and someone owns it.

1. Write the rule. One line per data type: what, how long after the role is filled, and who deletes it. Put the same information in your candidate notice.
2. Keep one place per role. File every interview for a requisition in one folder, so closing the role means one deletion, not a search.
3. Copy the decision record first. Before deleting, make sure the written evaluation, grounded in your criteria, is in your ATS.
4. Check for holds. A complaint, a charge, a lawsuit or a pending request from the candidate pauses deletion for that data.
5. Delete the source, then the trash. Remove the recording, transcript and AI notes, then empty the trash or wait out its window. Most tools keep deleted items for a while.
6. Chase the copies. Shared links, downloaded files, summaries pasted into email or Slack, exports to Notion or a drive: none of them disappear when you delete the original.
7. Log it. Date, role, what was deleted and by whom. If someone asks later, you can show the policy was followed.

Reline records interviews without a bot: audio is captured on your computer, then transcribed and stored in the cloud. You still tell the candidate before you record. Here is exactly how deletion works, so you can plan around it.

• No automatic delete schedule. Admins cannot set a workspace-wide rule such as “delete recordings after 90 days”. If you need the tool to enforce deletion, pick one from the table above or run the manual routine.
• Trash with a 30-day limit. A deleted note or folder goes to the trash, and anything left there is permanently deleted after 30 days, automatically.
• Delete permanently, right away. In the trash, Delete permanently removes a note at once, together with its recordings, its transcript and the index chat uses to answer questions. There is no separate button to delete only the recording.
• One folder per role. Permanently deleting a folder deletes everything inside it, so a role's interviews can go in one action.
• Creator or owner only. Only the note's creator or the workspace owner can delete a note permanently. Workspace admins cannot purge a member's notes.
• Private by default. Until you delete them, interview notes are visible only to the people you grant access to.

Copies made outside Reline, such as a summary pasted into your ATS, a Slack message or a Notion export, follow the retention rules of those tools.

• What exactly is deleted: audio, video, transcript, AI notes, summaries, clips, the search or chat index?
• What starts the clock: the meeting date, the last edit, or something else?
• Does a new rule apply to existing content, or only to future meetings?
• Is there a trash or archive window, and how long do backups keep deleted data?
• Can an admin enforce one rule for everyone, or can each user override it?
• Can deletion be paused for a legal hold?
• Which plan includes it, and is it set in the app or by the vendor's team?

No AI notetaker we checked knows when a role is filled. Several will delete on a schedule if you are on the right plan. The safe setup is a written rule per data type, a time-based backstop where your tool offers one, and a manual delete on the day the role closes, after the written evaluation is safely in your ATS.