Deleted endpoint
Learn about the different aspects of the deleted endpoint
20 May 2025Last updated: 30 September 2025
The ACLED dataset is updated weekly. Many events are added, but events can also be deleted if new information emerges that places an event outside of ACLED’s remit, or to avoid duplicate events in the dataset. If these deletions are not taken into account, your downloaded dataset will eventually look different from the latest (most up-to-date) version of the ACLED dataset. You can update your dataset by retrieving deleted event IDs (corresponding to the event_id_cnty values) from the deleted endpoint and then removing those events from your locally downloaded dataset.
The ACLED dataset is updated weekly. Many events are added, but events can also be deleted if new information emerges that places an event outside of ACLED’s remit, or to avoid duplicate events in the dataset. If these deletions are not taken into account, your downloaded dataset will eventually look different from the latest (most up-to-date) version of the ACLED dataset. You can update your dataset by retrieving deleted event IDs (corresponding to the event_id_cnty values) from the deleted endpoint and then removing those events from your locally downloaded dataset. You can find a more general guide on keeping your dataset updated here.
In this section you will learn about the following aspects of the deleted endpoint:
- Query filters.
- Returned data.
- An example call and its results.
Starting your call
You will need to build a unique URL to execute your API call (i.e. your data request) and download your data. Importantly, the initial part of your URL will differ when using the deleted endpoint versus other endpoints. Remember that the ACLED endpoint uses the following as the beginning of the URL: https://acleddata.com/api/acled/. When building a URL using the deleted endpoint, /acled/ is replaced with ’/deleted/, so your URL should begin with https://acleddata.com/api/deleted/. Beyond this small difference, building your URL for the deleted endpoint is identical to making a URL for any other endpoint offered by ACLED’s API.
If you are unfamiliar with how to use ACLED’s API we recommend that you begin by learning the basics of building URLs for API calls in our Get started and Advanced concepts sections.
You must first specify your preferred file format for download ("read"+{desired file format extension}) Your URL to request all available data from the deleted endpoint would then look something like this:
https://acleddata.com/api/deleted/read?_format=csv
Remember: As covered in the Get started section, your key and email address must be included in all requests. If you do not already have a key you can register here.
Query filters
Instead of receiving all the data from the deleted endpoint, you can select a subset of data by applying query filters (see Advanced concepts). You can specify which data your API call should return by using the following filters:
Query Name | Type | Query String |
event_id_cnty | LIKE | ?event_id_cnty={text} |
deleted_timestamp | >= | ?deleted_timestamp={unix timestamp} |
Like filters for other endpoints, these query filters are assigned a default query type (either =, >=, or LIKE). If you would like to do so, you can change a filter’s type by adding _where= at the end of the query name, followed by the desired type. For a detailed explanation of query types, visit the Advanced concepts section.
Note: You can convert a date to a Unix timestamp using any online timestamp calculator, such as the one linked here.
Returned data
The deleted endpoint returns a dataset with only two columns: event_id_cnty and deleted_timestamp.
Attribute Name | Type | Description |
event_id_cnty | string | An individual identifier by number and country acronym |
deleted_timestamp | int/date | The unix timestamp when this data entry was deleted |
You can learn how to use these data to update your own downloaded dataset in this guide.
Returned data - JSON only.
If you request data in a JSON format, the deleted endpoint will return additional information:
Attribute Name | Type | Description |
status | int | A number representing the request status |
success | boolean | A boolean representation on the success of the call |
last_update | int | The number of hours since the last update to the data |
count | int | The number of data rows returned |
messages | array | An array of information messages that may require future action |
data | array | The rows of data returned. For details of attributes returned in each row, see the section above |
filename | string | The filename that will be used for .csv calls |
data_query_restrictions | obj | Details of any restrictions applied to your query, including countries, event types, regions, data history, data recency |
Example - URL 💻
The following example demonstrates how to build an API call for the deleted endpoint. Imagine you want to gather all events that were deleted between November 2022 and March 2023. Note that these are events that were deleted during this time period, not deleted events with event_date values between November 2022 and March 2023.
- Begin with the ACLED API’s base URL.
https://acleddata.com/api/
- Add the deleted endpoint.
https://acleddata.com/api/deleted/
- Specify the response format.
https://acleddata.com/api/deleted/read.csv
- Add query filters specifying the timestamp parameters.
https://acleddata.com/api/deleted/read?_format=csv&deleted_timestamp=1667319467|1677641513
- Add an extra parameter with the suffix _where to specify that you want deleted timestamps between the selected values.
https://acleddata.com/api/deleted/read?_format=csv&deleted_timestamp=1667319467|1677641513&deleted_timestamp_where=BETWEEN
Now you can paste the URL into your internet browser, execute your API call, and receive your data.
