How to Automatically Clean Up Audit Logs in Dynamics 365 (Older than 2 Days)

Audit logs in Dynamics 365 (Dataverse) are extremely useful for tracking changes, but they can grow very fast — especially for high-volume entities like Opportunity and Lead. If left unchecked, audit history can consume a lot of storage and even slow down the system.

Dataverse does have a built-in “Audit Retention Policy,” but it only lets you delete audits in large chunks (30 days, 90 days, 1 year, etc.). There’s no out-of-the-box way to automatically delete audit records that are just a couple of days old, or to target only specific entities.

That’s why we built a simple, fully automated solution that runs every day and removes audit history older than 2 days — only for the entities we care about.

The Solution: A Scheduled process Power Automate + Custom Action

Below are the architecture details:

1. A recurring Power Automate Cloud Flow scheduled to run once per day.
2. The flow calls a Custom Action (as unbound action).
3. The Custom Action triggers a registered Plugin.
4. The Plugin creates a Bulk Delete Job that finds and deletes audit records filtered as older than 2 days for specific entities (Opportunity and Lead) only.

This approach is completely supported by Microsoft, runs asynchronously, and has almost zero performance impact on users.

Step-by-Step Code (C# Plugin)

public void Execute(IServiceProvider serviceProvider)

{

    var context = (IPluginExecutionContext)serviceProvider.GetService(typeof(IPluginExecutionContext));

    var factory = (IOrganizationServiceFactory)serviceProvider.GetService(typeof(IOrganizationServiceFactory));

    var service = factory.CreateOrganizationService(context.UserId);

    var tracing = (ITracingService)serviceProvider.GetService(typeof(ITracingService));

1. Build the query to find audits older than 2 days for Opportunity or Lead

var query = new QueryExpression("audit")
    {
        ColumnSet = new ColumnSet("auditid"), // we only need the ID
        Criteria = new FilterExpression(LogicalOperator.And)
        {
            Conditions =
            {
                new ConditionExpression("createdon", ConditionOperator.OlderThanXDays, 2)
            },
            FilterOperator = LogicalOperator.And,
            Filters =
            {
                new FilterExpression(LogicalOperator.Or)
                {
                    Conditions =
                    {
                        new ConditionExpression("objecttypecode", ConditionOperator.Equal, "opportunity"),
                        new ConditionExpression("objecttypecode", ConditionOperator.Equal, "lead")
                    }
                }
            }
        }
    };

    2. Create the Bulk Delete Job

var bulkDeleteRequest = new BulkDeleteRequest

    {

        JobName = "Daily Cleanup: Audit History Older Than 2 Days (Opportunity & Lead)",

        QuerySet = new QueryExpression[] { query },

        StartDateTime = DateTime.UtcNow.AddMinutes(5), // start in 5 minutes

        SendEmailNotification = false,

        RecurrencePattern = "" // one-time job; we create a new one every day

    };

    service.Execute(bulkDeleteRequest);

    tracing.Trace("Bulk Delete Job for old audit records submitted successfully.");

}

Why This Approach Rocks

• Fully automated — no manual work.
• Uses Microsoft’s recommended Bulk Delete system job (very efficient and safe).
• Zero impact on end users.
• Targets only the entities you want (easy to add Account, Contact, etc.).
• Easy to maintain or extend (just change the query).
• Runs off-peak if you schedule it at night.

Result

We went from large number of unnecessary audit data for Leads and Opportunities to keeping only the last 48 hours — instantly reclaiming storage and keeping the environment fast and healthy.

If you’re struggling with audit bloat in Dynamics 365 / Power Platform, give this pattern a try. It’s simple, reliable, and 100% supported.

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FAQ’s