How long do you need to keep job applicant and recruitment records for candidates you didn't hire?

Recruitment records for candidates you did not hire are not “scratch paper” you can discard once a role is filled. They are evidence that your hiring decisions were lawful and consistent, so most organizations keep them for a defined minimum period rather than purging them immediately.

What counts as an applicant record

These records typically include resumes and applications, job postings and descriptions, interview notes and scoring sheets, assessment or test results, screening and background-check documents, and correspondence with candidates. Treat them as a single category in your retention schedule so that everything tied to a hiring decision is governed consistently.

How long to keep them

There is no single universal number, but a common baseline for non-federal U.S. employers is to retain application and hiring records for a defined period after the hiring decision or the record’s creation. Under federal anti-discrimination rules enforced by the EEOC, employers generally must preserve these records for a set minimum, and longer where required for specific programs or larger employers. Federal agencies follow government-wide schedules instead, where routine recruitment case files that did not result in a hire usually have short, fixed retention periods.

Key principles to apply:

• Anchor to a trigger event. Most retention clocks start at the hiring decision date, not the application date.
• Hold longer when a dispute is active. If a charge, complaint, audit, or litigation arises, preserve all related applicant records until the matter is fully resolved — this legal hold overrides your normal disposition.
• Check overlapping obligations. Anti-discrimination, contractor, and sector-specific rules may each set their own minimums; follow the longest one that applies.

Build it into your schedule

Define a single retention rule for “applicant / non-hire recruitment records,” document the legal citation behind the period, and apply consistent, defensible disposition once the period and any holds have ended. Keeping records far beyond their required period creates needless privacy and discovery exposure, while destroying them too early can undermine your defense in a complaint.

For broader principles on setting and defending retention periods, see retention and disposition. Always confirm the specific minimums that govern your jurisdiction and industry before finalizing your schedule.