How to Clean Up Unused Custom Fields in Salesforce

If you’ve managed a Salesforce org for more than a year, you know the feeling: you open Object Manager and realize half your custom fields haven’t been touched in years. Nobody knows who created them or if it’s safe to delete them.

Field clutter is one of the most common forms of Salesforce technical debt — and it silently slows down your org, confuses users, and complicates every future project.

Here’s how to fix it.

Why It Matters

• Field limits — Most objects cap at 800 custom fields. Getting close causes performance issues.
• User confusion — Cluttered page layouts hurt adoption and data quality.
• Deployment noise — Unused fields show up in every change set and sandbox comparison.

Step 1: Get a Full Field List

Go to Setup → Object Manager → [Object] → Fields & Relationships to see all fields. The problem: there’s no native way to bulk export or filter by usage.

Use the Tooling API for a faster view:

Or use BOFC to export complete field lists across multiple objects into a spreadsheet instantly — no SQL needed.

Step 2: Check Where Each Field Is Used

A field is “unused” only if it’s referenced nowhere. Check:

• Page Layouts & Compact Layouts
• Reports and List Views
• Flows, Process Builder, Workflow Rules
• Validation Rules and Formula Fields
• Apex code — search our code base for the field’s API name

Don’t forget: also check if the field contains data. Salesforce permanently erases field data after 15 days of deletion. Always export first.

Step 3: Back Up Field Data

For any field with populated records, export the data before deleting — via Data Loader, a Report export, or Setup → Data Export.

Step 4: Remove References, Then Delete

Salesforce blocks deletion if a field is still referenced. Remove it from all layouts, flows, and validation rules first. Then:

1. Go to Setup → Object Manager → [Object] → Fields & Relationships
2. Click the drop down next to the field → Delete

The field sits in an “erased” state for 15 days (restorable), then it’s gone permanently.

Doing this for 30+ fields? Native Salesforce forces you to delete one at a time. BOFC handles bulk field deletion across objects in minutes.

Step 5: Verify

After cleanup, check your field count, run key pages and reports, and watch for Apex errors. Set a reminder to repeat this audit every 6–12 months — field clutter grows back fast.

Quick Time Estimate

3 Mistakes to Avoid

1. Skipping the data backup — deletion is permanent after 15 days
2. Missing Flow references — a broken Flow can fail silently
3. Auditing only one object — check Account, Contact, Opportunity, Lead, and all custom objects

Keeping your Salesforce org lean is ongoing work. The cleanup itself is straightforward — the bottleneck is usually doing it at scale. That’s where a bulk metadata tool like BOFC pays for itself quickly.

Try BOFC free →