Delete a collection

Deleting collections

This endpoint allows you to permanently remove a collection and all its objects from Tallyfy Answers¹. This operation is irreversible and should be used with caution.

Permanent Action

Deleting a collection permanently removes all objects within it. This action cannot be undone, and there is no way to recover the data once deleted.

API endpoint

DELETE /v1/collections/{collection_name}

Path parameters

Parameter	Type	Required	Description
collection_name	string	Yes	Name of the collection to delete

Response

A successful deletion returns a 200 OK status code with a confirmation response:

{
  "name": "products",
  "status": "deleted"
}

Error scenarios

Status	Description
404	Collection not found
400	Invalid collection name format
403	Permission denied (if applicable)

Example request

curl -X DELETE https://go.tallyfy.com/api/collections/products \
  -H "X-Answers-API-Key: your_api_key"

When to delete a collection

Consider deleting a collection when:

• The data is no longer needed for any purpose
• You need to rebuild a collection with a different structure
• You want to remove test or development data
• You’re performing cleanup of unused resources

Alternatives to deletion

Instead of permanently deleting a collection, consider these alternatives:

• Export the data before deletion for backup purposes
• Create a new collection with only the objects you want to keep
• Use application-level filtering to hide certain objects from users

Best practices

• Always confirm collection names before deletion
• Consider implementing a confirmation step in your application
• Back up important data before deletion
• Use descriptive logging to track deletion operations
• Verify permissions carefully to prevent unauthorized deletions

Related articles

Objects > Delete an object

The DELETE endpoint permanently removes specific objects from Tallyfy Answers collections using unique identifiers and returns confirmation upon successful deletion with no recovery option available.

Collections > Update a collection

The PATCH endpoint allows modifying existing collection properties like descriptions in Tallyfy Answers while maintaining limitations such as unchangeable collection names and automatic schema detection.

Collections > Get a collection

The Tallyfy Answers API provides a GET endpoint to retrieve detailed information about specific collections including metadata schema information and object counts using the collection’s unique name.

Collections > Create a collection

To create collections in Tallyfy Answers you must first make a POST request to the /v1/collections endpoint with a unique collection name and optional description before adding any objects to the collection.

Footnotes

1. Tallyfy’s semantic search and knowledge management system using vector embeddings ↩