Auto-enable deletion vectors

Use this workspace setting to configure whether new Delta tables are created with deletion vectors enabled by default.

This setting applies to all tables created using Databricks SQL warehouses (version 2023.50 and above) and clusters running Databricks Runtime 14.0 and above.

Databricks recommends using deletion vectors for all tables except for those used in workloads with incompatible Databricks Runtime versions or external Delta clients. See What are deletion vectors?.

Tables with deletion vectors enabled automatically leverage predictive I/O for updates in Photon-enabled clusters. See Use predictive I/O to accelerate updates.

What are the available options?

You can choose from the following options:

Option	Effect
Default	Disabled. Do not automatically enable deletion vectors.
New UC managed and Databricks SQL tables	Enable deletion vectors on all new Delta tables managed by Unity Catalog or created in Databricks SQL.
All new tables	Enable deletion vectors on all new Delta tables.
Disabled	Do not automatically enable deletion vectors.

Note

You must restart any running compute to apply changes to this setting.

What is the default setting for auto-enable deletion vectors?

Databricks has introduced the Auto-Enable Deletion Vectors setting as an opt-in.

During the introductory period, Databricks encourages admins to manually configure one of the explicit choices.

In the near future, the behavior associated with the Default option will change from Disabled to All new tables. To avoid having this change automatically applied to your workspaces, select an option other than Default.

Databricks recommends selecting Disabled if you read newly created tables using clients that don’t support deletion vectors. See Compatibility with Delta clients.