Free tool

Log Retention Period Estimator

Find the commonly recommended log retention periods for GDPR, NIS2, PCI DSS, HIPAA, ISO 27001, SOX, and other frameworks, then estimate the resulting log storage requirements. The result is intended as an indicative planning guideline and should not be considered legal advice.

Volume input mode

Regulation / framework

Framework

Typical guideline shown below. Edit the retention field if your policy differs.

Environment

Employees

Used to estimate workstation and identity-related events.

Servers

Application, database, file and infrastructure servers.

Network & security devices

Firewalls, switches, routers, VPN gateways, IDS/IPS and similar devices.

Average event size

bytes

700 bytes is a commonly used planning assumption.

Known daily volume

Average log volume

GB / day

Use your current ingestion rate from your log management or SIEM platform.

Retention

Retention period

days

Pre-filled from the selected framework. Override with your own policy at any time.

Immediately searchable (hot storage)

days

Some frameworks (e.g. PCI DSS) require a portion of history to be immediately available for analysis.