Forum Discussion
Understanding Planner plan options
Hello! First time posting because I'm not an M365 admin at my company so apparently cannot contact Microsoft directly. We are a small company with about 25 employees and have started using Planner to capture actions from meetings. The biggest concern with this is how to recover task cards that are accidentally deleted.
Looking at the Planner 3 plan, it looks like that covers task history. If we have the board owner on a Planner 3 plan, can regular users create, assign, add checklist items, and comment on task cards?
Though if I'm understanding correctly, task history does not provide a recovery option if a task is accidentally deleted. It seems that we need a third party tool to be able to recover deleted tasks. Is that an accurate understanding, or does Microsoft have a native way to recover tasks?
Thank you!
Hi jessicaobrien,
You’ve got the right idea about how Planner works. Even with Planner 3, there isn’t a built‑in way to recover a task once it’s been deleted. Planner doesn’t have a recycle bin or restore option. The Planner 3 license tier does give you task history, but that history only exists while the task is still around.
If the plan owner has Planner 3, everyone else can still use the board normally. They can create tasks, assign them, add checklist items, and comment. They just won’t see the premium features themselves.
And you're correct, you'll need a third‑party backup solution to recover deleted tasks. A few well‑known options that support Planner backup are:
- AvePoint Cloud Backup
- Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365
- Barracuda Cloud‑to‑Cloud Backup
- Keepit
- Synology Active Backup for Microsoft 365
These tools can back up Planner tasks and restore them if something gets deleted by accident.
Hope this helps!
-Rob
6 Replies
Unfortunately theres no native way to recover deleted tasks in Planner right now. Task history in Plan 3 shows you changes but it wont let you restore a deleted card. For your setup, regular users can totally create, assign and comment on tasks even if only the board owner has Plan 3. The history features are the only thing gated to that license.
For a safety net, you could set up a simple Power Automate flow that copies task data to a SharePoint list whenever a task is created or updated. Not perfect but at least youd have a backup to reference.
Hi NorahFromHR, thank you! That's a good suggestion as an alterative to a third party solution. I currently have a monthly backup running to Excel, but your suggestion would capture any card created. I will keep that in mind when I present options to my manager.
Currently, Microsoft Planner does not have a dedicated recycle bin feature for tasks. Deleted tasks are not stored in a recoverable bin within Planner.
Currently, Microsoft Planner does not have a dedicated recycle bin feature for tasks. Deleted tasks are not stored in a recoverable bin within Planner.
Hi jessicaobrien,
You’ve got the right idea about how Planner works. Even with Planner 3, there isn’t a built‑in way to recover a task once it’s been deleted. Planner doesn’t have a recycle bin or restore option. The Planner 3 license tier does give you task history, but that history only exists while the task is still around.
If the plan owner has Planner 3, everyone else can still use the board normally. They can create tasks, assign them, add checklist items, and comment. They just won’t see the premium features themselves.
And you're correct, you'll need a third‑party backup solution to recover deleted tasks. A few well‑known options that support Planner backup are:
- AvePoint Cloud Backup
- Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365
- Barracuda Cloud‑to‑Cloud Backup
- Keepit
- Synology Active Backup for Microsoft 365
These tools can back up Planner tasks and restore them if something gets deleted by accident.
Hope this helps!
-Rob
Thank you for the confirmation RobSoto!
