Data lifecycle

Last updated: 2026-09-06. This page describes how data moves through Layers from collection to deletion. It covers your store’s data and your shoppers’ data, and it reflects current operating practice. For the legal terms, see the Terms of Use and Privacy Statement. For what the AI features do with this data, see AI & your data.

What is collected

Category	What it contains	Where it comes from
Catalog	Products, variants, collections, inventory, pricing, metafields, images, and store content such as pages and articles	Mirrored from Shopify through Catalog Sync webhooks and scheduled bulk exports
Configuration	Merchandising rules, sort orders, synonyms, redirects, blocks, search settings, and dashboard user accounts	Created by your team in the Layers dashboard or through the API
Shopper events	Collection views, product views, clicks, impressions, add to carts, searches, and block views, each tied to a session identifier and, for signed-in shoppers, a Shopify customer ID	Captured by the Storefront Pixel when analytics processing is allowed for the shopper
Request logs	Search, browse, and block requests made by your storefront, including the query, filters, and the results returned	Recorded by the Layers API as it serves storefront traffic
Purchases	Order lines with the attribution identifiers needed to connect a purchase to an earlier search or browse session	Shopify order webhooks
Shopper feedback and affinities	Search feedback, quiz responses, and derived shopper affinities, each tied to a session identifier	Storefront widgets and integrations
Privacy request records	The customer ID, request type, status, and result summary for each customer data or redaction request	Shopify privacy webhooks
Embeddings	Vector representations of catalog content and of search queries	Generated by Layers from your catalog and from incoming queries
Aggregated analytics	Click-through, conversion, and popularity metrics per product, collection, search term, and block	Computed by Layers from shopper events and request logs
Operational logs	Application logs, error reports, and performance traces used to run and troubleshoot the service	Generated by Layers infrastructure

Shopper IP addresses are processed transiently at the edge to resolve country, region, and city and to apply rate limiting. The address itself is not stored with events or in application logs.

Retention while your store is active

Category	Retention	Notes
Catalog	Kept in sync with Shopify for as long as the app is installed	When a product is deleted or unpublished in Shopify, the next sync removes it from Layers
Configuration	Kept for as long as the app is installed	Rules and sort orders you delete are removed from the active configuration immediately and purged from storage on a rolling basis
Shopper events	60 days	Raw event files in object storage and the analytics tables built from them are both deleted on a rolling 60-day schedule
Request logs	30 days in the primary database; 60 days for raw request files in object storage	Request records older than the window are deleted on a rolling schedule
Purchases	60 days	Same window as shopper events
Shopper feedback and affinities	60 days	Same window as shopper events
Privacy request records	90 days after the request is completed	Kept so you can review the outcome of each request in the dashboard
Embeddings	Lifetime of the catalog item they describe	Regenerated when the product changes and deleted when the product is removed from Layers
Aggregated analytics	Kept for as long as the app is installed	Product-level metrics remain after the underlying raw events have expired
Operational logs	Held by the logging and observability vendors listed on the sub-processors page, for the retention period of each vendor	Operational logs contain request metadata and may contain search queries, but do not contain shopper identifiers beyond the session identifier

Retention windows are applied per store and are not extended by request. If your compliance program needs a shorter window for shopper events, contact support@uselayers.com.

After you uninstall

Uninstalling the Layers app starts a 30-day grace period. During this period your data is retained but sync activity stops, so you can reinstall and pick up where you left off. The process is documented in full under App uninstallation and data retention. At the end of the grace period:

Your store record and all associated data are permanently deleted from Layers’ primary databases. This includes the catalog mirror, configuration, embeddings, aggregated analytics, and any shopper events or request logs that have not already expired.
Per-store analytics storage is decommissioned.
Access tokens issued to your storefront and dashboard users stop working.

Deletion from primary storage is not reversible. If you need an export of your configuration before the grace period ends, contact support@uselayers.com.

Backups

Layers takes automated backups of its primary databases for disaster recovery. Backups are encrypted at rest and are only restored to recover the service after an infrastructure failure. They are not used to serve traffic or to restore an individual store’s data after the grace period has ended.

Backup rotation window: 30 days. A backup taken on the day your data is deleted from primary storage is itself deleted no later than 30 days afterwards.
Combined timeline: your data is fully gone from Layers systems no later than 60 days after uninstall (30-day grace period plus the 30-day backup rotation window).
Shopper events and request logs live in per-store analytics storage that is decommissioned at the end of the grace period and is not included in long-lived backups.

Data subject requests

Layers processes Shopify’s mandatory privacy webhooks automatically:

Customer data request: when a shopper asks you for their data through Shopify, Layers compiles the search queries tied to that customer ID and a count of matching records in each data store, and makes them available to you in the dashboard.
Customer redact: when Shopify sends a redaction request for a customer, Layers removes or anonymizes the customer ID in analytics tables, request logs, search feedback, derived affinities, and quiz responses linked to the customer’s sessions, and anonymizes the customer’s earlier privacy request records. Copies of the customer ID that may exist in application logs or observability traces are not individually redacted. They expire according to the retention of the vendors on the sub-processors page.
Shop redact: when Shopify sends a shop redaction request after uninstall, Layers queues the store for deletion on the same schedule as the grace period above.

If a shopper contacts you directly rather than through Shopify, email support@uselayers.com with the Shopify customer ID and Layers will handle the request within the timeframes required by applicable law.

Next steps

AI & your data for how model providers fit into this picture.
Infrastructure & Sub-processors for where data is hosted.
Incident response overview for how Layers handles a security or availability incident.

Overview

Core Concepts

Merchandising

Search & Discovery

Catalog & Data

LayersQL

Shopify Integration

Legal

Data lifecycle

What is collected

Retention while your store is active

After you uninstall

Backups

Data subject requests

Next steps

​What is collected

​Retention while your store is active

​After you uninstall

​Backups

​Data subject requests

​Next steps

What is collected

Retention while your store is active

After you uninstall

Backups

Data subject requests

Next steps