Manage Data

Use the following data management commands to write and delete data with InfluxQL:

• Write data with INSERT
• Delete series with DELETE
• Delete measurements with DROP MEASUREMENT

Write data with INSERT

The INSERT statement writes line protocol to a database and retention policy.

Syntax

INSERT [INTO <database>[.<retention-policy>]] <line-protocol>

• The INTO clause is optional. If the command does not include INTO, you must specify the database with USE <database_name> when using the InfluxQL shell or with the db query string parameter in the InfluxDB 1.x compatibility API request.

Examples

• Insert data into the a specific database and retention policy
• Insert data into the a the default retention policy of a database
• Insert data into the currently used database

Insert data into the a specific database and retention policy

INSERT INTO mydb.myrp example-m,tag1=value1 field1=1i 1640995200000000000

Insert data into the a the default retention policy of a database

INSERT INTO mydb example-m,tag1=value1 field1=1i 1640995200000000000

Insert data into the currently used database

The following example uses the InfluxQL shell.

> USE mydb
> INSERT example-m,tag1=value1 field1=1i 1640995200000000000

Delete series with DELETE

The DELETE statement deletes all points from a series in a database.

Syntax

DELETE FROM <measurement_name> WHERE [<tag_key>='<tag_value>'] | [<time interval>]

You must include either the FROM clause, the WHERE clause, or both.

{{% note %}}

• DELETE supports regular expressions in the FROM clause when specifying measurement names and in the WHERE clause when specifying tag values.
• DELETE does not support fields in the WHERE clause. {{% /note %}}

Examples

• Delete all measurement data
• Delete data in a measurement that has a specific tag value
• Delete data before or after specified time

Delete all measurement data

Delete all data associated with the measurement h2o_feet:

DELETE FROM "h2o_feet"

Delete data in a measurement that has a specific tag value

Delete all data associated with the measurement h2o_quality and where the tag randtag equals 3:

DELETE FROM "h2o_quality" WHERE "randtag" = '3'

Delete data before or after specified time

Delete all data in the database that occur before January 01, 2020:

DELETE WHERE time < '2020-01-01'

A successful DELETE query returns an empty result.

If you need to delete points in the future, you must specify the future time period because DELETE SERIES runs for time < now() by default.

Delete future points:

DELETE FROM device_data WHERE "device" = 'sensor1" and time > now() and < '2024-01-14T01:00:00Z'

Delete points in the future within a specified time range:

DELETE FROM device_data WHERE "device" = 'sensor15" and time >= '2024-01-01T12:00:00Z' and <= '2025-06-30T11:59:00Z'

Delete measurements with DROP MEASUREMENT

The DROP MEASUREMENT statement deletes all data and series from the specified measurement and deletes the measurement from the index.

Syntax

DROP MEASUREMENT <measurement_name>

Example

Delete the measurement h2o_feet:

DROP MEASUREMENT "h2o_feet"

A successful DROP MEASUREMENT query returns an empty result.

{{% warn %}} The DROP MEASUREMENT command is very resource intensive. We do not recommend this command for bulk data deletion. Use the DELETE FROM command instead, which is less resource intensive. {{% /warn %}}