Reactivate Bitbucket workspace

[-IronLupus-]

Hi!

Go the e-mail about my Free Bitbucket workspaces:

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If your Free Bitbucket workspace contains repositories but hasn't been visited in the past 6 months:

◦ We'll deactivate these workspaces on January 15, 2026, making all content inaccessible. To keep your workspace, sign in before May 15, 2026, and click Reactivate workspace. After this date, any inactive workspaces will be permanently deleted, along with their content.

Can't find the "Reactivate workspace" button.

Could you, please, tell where it's located?

[Syahrul · Accepted solution]

Hey everyone,

The reactivate button will only appear for workspaces that are scheduled to be deactivated after January 15, 2026. You can log in and click 'reactivate' on the affected workspace to keep it.

You have until May 15, 2026, to complete this task, after which the repository and its content will be permanently deleted. For more details, please check our community post here.

Regards,
Syahrul

[-IronLupus-]

O! Just saw your comment after writing the reply above.)))

So, I got it right.))))

Thank you!

[Vincent Boutot]

Dude, I just saw the same email and thought about making a post too! 

I'm going to be honnest, I'm not here about the reactivate button, but about the update in general: Them DEACTIVATING or DELETING our projects annoys the SHIT out of me! 

It all started with Confluence documentation. An email saying if I didn't logged back in, they were going to delete my documentation pages. And this is still going on every ~2 months I get the message "Your subscription will be deactivated due to inactivity soon". 

First of all when I make documentation pages, they aren't for in 2 months. They are for in 10 years, when I want to make modifications to my now depricated tool, so WTF is the point of making documentation if your going to delete it? And I'm talking about 6 pages of documentation. What are they saving by deleting this? 10kb of storage?

And now they are "Deactivating" our entire codebases??????? And free codebases are Max. 1GB and data storage is so cheap I just don't understand the move here.

I'm trusting them to store my life's work, but if they touch any of it, I'm moving tf out!

Anyway, I too couldn't find the reactivate button.

[ltfschoen]

I just signed in and couldn't find any "Reactivate workspaces" button. If I go to https://bitbucket.org/<MY_USERNAME>/workspace/settings there's only a button "Update workspace". Scary stuff!

[-IronLupus-]

Same thing!

Maybe according to the words "deactivate these workspaces on January 15, 2026" and "sign in before May 15, 2026, and click Reactivate", this button would appear after the 15th of Jan?

[HashRocketSyntax]

Atlassian should fully communicate how Reactivate Workspace functions when sending out emails about deletion tied to inactivity

[Web Master]

I had no Workspaces visible nor did I have any Repos visible - Just only an error message like this.  I also had no Reactivate Button or banner as the post says. NOTHING!

---

Something went wrong...

If the problem persists, contact support and include the error code displayed below.

2ac712a6f6c045f2b0a45a42e7c4ad58

but now I think I got it!

Heres to everyone needing proper help!

1. Click on your avatar
2. Click View All Workspaces
3. Create a new Workspace
4. Accept prompts and create new workspace
5. Give a new name --> save (or create)
6. it might error out and say "Resource Not Found". https://app.screencast.com/1R1Y3MMDKuOfL 
7. Click on Dashboard link
8. If you see your newly created workspace click it...
9. Dashboard, Click on View All Repositories
10. Now I saw my Banner!!!!!!!! https://app.screencast.com/yQeQb6SIkXh2G
11.  and now I see my repos!--> https://app.screencast.com/rEdaBizDVUKcW
12. Enjoy!

[-IronLupus-]

Hi!

I've created a new repository ("+Create" button on the workspaces list page), but it didn't create a new workspace in the workspaces list.

I'm not a tech-guy, honestly, so could you please tell in steps, how to create exactly the new workspace?

(Sorry, if I'm asking the obvious thing, just tech stuff is kinda hell for me.)))

[tkersh]

I'm in the same boat, none of my workspaces show up on the workspaces page, and I can't go to them directly, but there's no "reactivate" button anywhere.

Has anyone been able to find it?

[neil_mayhew]

The button appears only if you need to reactivate. If there's no button, you don't need to reactivate.

[tkersh]

But my workspaces aren't there at all.
My ssh key is still there and valid, but I can't push or fetch from the workspace and it doesn't show up  in the UI.

[photo3dlab]

I'm in the same boat too. no "reactive" button. Doesn't mean no need to reactivate as all my repos are gone. I don't know what "workspace" is. @tkersh did you solve this problem?

[tkersh]

@Syahrul That's at least two of us:

- Workspaces don't show so they've already been deactivated

- No button to reactivate

[-IronLupus-]

Hi!

I just checked and my workspaces are there with no "reactivate" buttons.

[tkersh]

I think the key is that if your workspaces still show at this point, they're good.

If they don't, they've been deactivated and there should be a "reactivate" button.

I have neither, and that's a problem.

I'm hoping someone from Atlassian can guide us to where the Reactivate button ended up, since it isn't where the email said it would be, and I don't find it anywhere on the account admin or other pages that some have suggested.

[photo3dlab]

I fixed the problem by creating a random temporary workspace. This triggered my previous workspace to reappear with a re-enable option. All my repos are now fully restored.

[neil_mayhew]

That's terrible UX! Unfortunately, this is the kind of thing I've come to expect from Atlassian. I recommend migrating your workspaces to GitLab or GitHub.

[tkersh]

@photo3dlab It works! Thanks!

I was hoping the older workspace would reappear right away, but I had to sign out and in again, then go to all workspaces and voila!

When you reactivate, you'll likely get a dialog about having to link it to an Organization: don't panic, that seems to be just you and if you click through it will create a (free) org for you.

Job done, back in business.

To @neil_mayhew 's point, it is a terrible UX. I've been with bitbucket since forever and it's a shame to see them trailing the market so much. I do have other gitlab and github accounts for different projects, may have to consider moving. But good for now.

[Web Master]

@neil_mayhew You mentioned: "The button appears only if you need to reactivate. If there's no button, you don't need to reactivate."

This is not true.  Repos are going to get deleted if no action is taken.  I fixed my issue
and made a post on it: https://community.atlassian.com/forums/Bitbucket-questions/Reactivate-Bitbucket-workspace/qaa-p/3224162#M124401

They actually have a bug in how and when the button to Reactivate appears.

so don't just "leave it" ....you'll lose your code, if you don't click Reactivate.

[sebipopa]

If there's no button then it means that the workspace is considered active and won't be deleted, we're safe.

If your Free Bitbucket workspace contains repositories and has been actively used in the last 6 months:
◦ Your workspace is considered active and won't be affected by this cleanup.

[Vitalik Yarmus]

But where the button should be? I have workspace that is inactive from 2020, but I can't find the button anywhere.

[-IronLupus-]

Maybe there is any chance that there would appear some "green flag" that we shouldn't worry about our workspaces?

[Web Master]

I just fixed mine!  read my post above