We don’t ever recommend deleting a title from Vimeo On Demand. In most cases, you can simply unpublish a title and leave it at that. Deleting a title is non-reversible, will permanently clear all of your VOD Stats for that title and may cause a disruptive experience for your viewers. If you're selling a subscription, you need to delete your page in order to cancel any active subscriptions (if you simply unpublish your subscription page, active subscribers will remain subscribed).
If you do need to delete a VOD title after it has been published, the process is outlined below.
Starting the deletion process
- First, you must unpublish your Vimeo On Demand page.
- Once your title is unpublished, you can click “Delete VOD” in the Page tab of your VOD Settings. (Make absolutely sure you want to delete the VOD - this is not reversible!)
Timeline for deletion
VOD deletion functions differently depending on what type of active purchases you have:
- If you have no active sales or rentals, your VOD title will be immediately deleted.
- If you only have active sales, your VOD will be deleted in 30 days, as those who paid the “Buy” price are guaranteed a 30 day window to back up or watch their purchases a final time.
- If you only have active rentals, your VOD title will be deleted once the active rentals have expired.
- If you have active rentals and purchases, your VOD title will be deleted 30 days after your last rental expires. (Allowing for the same 30 day “Buy” purchasers window.)
In other words, your title could take up to 395 days to be permanently deleted (a one year rental plus 30 days).
In all cases, once you delete a VOD, you will immediately lose access to the Vimeo On Demand page, comments, settings, and stats. This action is not reversible!
Notification to buyers
When the 30 day countdown for people who purchased your title begins, they will receive a series of notification emails urging them to download or watch the title again. These messages will be sent 30 days, 7 days, and 1 day before the permanent deletion date.
Releasing your VOD videos
Once the deletion process is completed and all purchases have been honored, all of the videos are released back to your account with the “Only me” privacy setting. You are then free to do whatever you want with the video — make it public, delete it, add it to a new VOD page, etc.