Why and how are some answers deleted?
Answers that do not fundamentally answer the question may be removed. This includes answers that are:
- commentary on the question or other answers
- asking another, different question
- “thanks!” or “me too!” responses
- exact duplicates of other answers
- barely more than a link to an external site
- not even a partial answer to the actual question
If you wish to improve an existing answer, click the edit link beneath it. For more guidance, see How to Answer.
Answers can be deleted at any time by their authors, unless the answer has been accepted by the question asker.
Answers can also be deleted by the community. Moderators can delete any answer, and trusted community members can vote to delete answers scoring -1 or lower (3 votes will result in deletion).
Additionally, any answer that accumulates enough offensive or spam flags will be automatically deleted.
What happens when a post is deleted?
Once a post has been deleted, it will disappear for all users except developers, moderators, and users with over 10,000 reputation. Deleted answers are also visible to the original author. However, deleted posts can be undeleted by casting undelete votes. Once a post has 3 undelete votes, it will no longer be deleted.
The community-curated FAQ contains more details.
If your question was deleted, please see "Why and how are some questions deleted?"