Leaving Tabla: export everything, then delete what you want gone

Most products document the entrance and let you find the exit yourself. This page is the exit, written with the same care as the rest: what to take with you, in what order to delete, and exactly where the edges are. Not because we're eager to see you go — because a database you can leave is one you can trust, and we'd rather you could leave, and didn't. The full argument is at /why-you-can-leave.

Step one: take everything

Click the database's name in the top bar and choose Export database…. One action, one file: the download starts immediately — no job to poll, no emailed link — and lands as <database-name>-export.zip. Any member can run it, viewers included; exporting was never a privilege.

Inside the zip:

• manifest.json — the full structure: every table, its fields, their types and settings, select choices, which fields link to which tables, the wiring behind formula, lookup and rollup fields, and every saved view with its filters, sorts and the rest of its settings.
• One .csv per table — every record, one column per field, in the grid's order. Excel, Numbers, Postgres and pandas open these as-is.
• comments.csv — every comment on every record, with who wrote it and when. Editors and owners get this file; a viewer, who can't read comments in the app, doesn't.
• attachments/ — your actual files, bytes not links, named <id>-<filename> with the filenames you gave them.
• attachments.csv — which file belongs to which record.
• README.txt — what everything is, in plain words.

Nothing in the zip needs Tabla to open, and an account inside its storage limit gets every byte it has: the export's attachment ceiling is the storage ceiling. Scripting it is one call — GET https://tabladb.com/api/databases/:id/export with an API key. What each piece looks like in detail is inside the export file.

Export per database — if you have three databases, that's three zips.

Step two: delete what you want gone

Three sizes of deletion exist in the product, each behind its own door:

Records delete into the trash, restorable for 7 days, then purged. To skip the wait, purge them from the trash panel or use Empty trash — immediate and permanent.

Tables delete from the table tab's menu: Delete table takes effect at once, with an Undo in the notice for eight seconds, and the table then waits 7 days in a trash of its own — the ⋮ at the end of the tab strip → Deleted tables… — before the real Postgres table underneath is dropped. Owner-only, both directions. To skip the wait there is no button; the seven days run out on their own.

Databases delete from the database menu: Delete database…, again typed-name confirmation, again owner-only. It drops every table, record, view and webhook, and the real Postgres tables under them, immediately — including any table sitting in that trash. Over the API it's DELETE https://tabladb.com/api/databases/:id.

Once a deletion is final, the data no longer exists in the product. It survives only inside the nightly off-site backups, which roll over on a 30-day retention — after 30 days it's gone from there too. Where those live is where your data lives.

Step three: your account

Deleting your account is not self-serve today — there's no button for it in the product, and we'd rather say that plainly than hide it. Email support@tabladb.com (or use Contact support… in the account menu) and ask. As /your-data puts it: it's gone from the product straight away, and off our systems within thirty days as the backups roll over.

Export first. We won't remind you twice — the deletion is real, and the zip is the only copy that's yours afterward.

If you're a member of databases you don't own, ask their owners to remove you — membership ends immediately, and everything you created stays with the team, stamped as yours.

If you're not leaving, only stopping

Worth separating: stopping payment, once billing exists, is not leaving. The published deal on /pricing is that canceling drops you to the free plan and "nothing is deleted — not a record, not a file, not a table." Past the free limits you can't add more, but everything keeps working and the export stays free. A lapsed card is not a hostage situation; only the deletions above delete anything.

Why this page exists

An export that only matters on the day you leave is the easiest feature in the world to let rot — its users are already half out the door. Ours stays good because it's load-bearing: if you can take everything and go, any day, then every day you stay is a day we earned. Test it now, while you have no intention of leaving — download the zip, open the CSVs, check the files are files. It's your data. You shouldn't have to take our word for it.