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Unarchive Trello cards and lists: our quick-start guide
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Unarchive Trello cards and lists: our quick-start guide

A headshot of Dan Ivory
Dan Ivory
19th April, 2023
A builder's hat surrounded by colourful shapes
A headshot of Dan Ivory
Dan Ivory
19th April, 2023

Bring your Trello cards and lists back to life. Read our handy guide and never lose a card or list again!

Trello boards can quickly become very busy, with lots of cards being added over time, especially when you're working with multiple projects and team members. We don't always take the time to do the digital decluttering that keeps our boards organised and easy to use. This can easily result in “card blindness”, meaning you have cards on your board, but don't notice them anymore because they've been there so long!

One tool to help combat this is archiving.

Archiving cards and lists let you remove cards from your board, but it differs from deleting cards because it keeps them safe for later. This is handy in case you think you might need them again later.
Once you've learned to archive cards and lists, you'll need to know how to bring them back to your board. Read on to discover how to easily archive and unarchive your cards and lists.
👉 Prefer video guides? Head here for a quick tutorial.

How to archive Trello cards

First, a quick recap on how to archive cards in case you are brand new to this concept.
To archive, click on the pencil icon (✏️) on the front of your card.
A Trello card with a pencil icon in the top-right corner
From here, you can see the “Archive” option at the bottom of that list.
A list of options to the right of a Trello card
That’s it!

How to archive Trello lists

You can also archive a whole list if you need. To do this, just click on the three small dots in the top right of a list. Then select either “Archive all the cards in this list…” or “Archive this list”.
A dropdown menu on a Trello list with options to edit and archive cards

How to unarchive Trello cards

To find the archive and locate your archived cards, you need to click the three dots in the top right corner of your board:
The three dots menu button on a Trello board
Then select "More".
A dropdown menu on a Trello board with options to edit the board
Followed by "Archived items".
A dropdown menu on a Trello board with the option to archive all items
From here, we can see all of our archived cards. Find the one you want to unarchive and click "Send to board".
A screenshot of a Trello archive with an archived card listed under it
The card will then be sent back to the board in the same position that it was originally archived from.

How to unarchive Trello Lists

Archived lists are similar to cards. Follow the same steps as cards until you reach the Archived Items section.
Here you will need to select the option “Switch to Lists”.
A screenshot of a Trello archive with a list of archived cards
Now you can see your archived lists.
A screenshot of all archived lists in Trello
Select the one you want to unarchive and select "Send to board", and it will reappear on your board in the same position as before.

It's as easy as that!
Looking for other ways to clean up your Trello board? Get our Power-Up that lets you delete cards in 2 clicks - completely free of charge!
Written by
A headshot of Dan Ivory
Dan Ivory
Product Manager
Dan is a Product Manager at Kolekti and is based in the UK. He's passionate about creating apps that boost collaborative work management in Trello and monday.com.

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