How Long to Keep Restaurant Records, a Retention Table by Record Type
How long to keep restaurant records, by type. Shellfish tags, temperature logs, fire and hood reports, grease manifests, payroll and OSHA logs, with sources.
Key takeaways
- The FDA Food Code sets only three retention periods, 90 days for shellfish tags and raw fish freezing records and 6 months for cook chill and sous vide records.
- Temperature and cooling logs have no federal retention period, and the Food Code does not require them, so your health department, insurer or franchisor sets the number.
- Fire protection records are commonly kept 3 years under the International Fire Code, but your state may change that, so check the code your fire marshal enforces.
- Three years for operational and facility records, plus 90 days in date order for shellfish tags, covers most rules a restaurant meets.
On this page
Ask five operators how long to keep temperature logs and you will get five confident answers. Ninety days. A year. Three years. Forever.
The correct answer is that the FDA Food Code does not require you to keep temperature logs at all, and sets no retention period for them. Whichever number you were given came from your health department, your insurer, your franchisor or a third party audit scheme, and it is worth knowing which, because only one of those can shut you down.
This is the table we wish existed when we went looking. Every period below is cited. Where there is no legal period, we say so instead of inventing one. Citations were checked on 3 November 2026.
- Food Code periods
- Only three: shellfish tags 90 days, raw fish freezing records 90 days, cook chill and sous vide 6 months
- Temperature logs
- No federal period, and no federal requirement to keep them
- Fire protection records
- Commonly 3 years under the International Fire Code, as your state adopts it
- Traceability records
- 2 years, not enforced before 20 July 2028
- A safe default
- 3 years for operational and facility records, 90 days in date order for shellfish tags
The short version
The Food Code sets only three numeric retention periods for records. None of them covers temperature logs.
| Record | How long | Where it comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Shellfish tags, labels or invoices | 90 calendar days | Food Code 3-203.12 |
| Parasite destruction records for raw fish | 90 calendar days | Food Code 3-402.12 |
| Reduced oxygen packaging records | 6 months | Food Code 3-502.12 |
| FSMA 204 traceability records | 2 years | 21 CFR 1.1455(d) |
| Fire suppression and extinguisher service records | 3 years, commonly | International Fire Code, as adopted by your state |
| Hood and exhaust cleaning reports | Set by your fire code | Local fire code |
| Grease trap manifests | 3 years typical, 5 in Houston | Municipal rules |
| Elevator maintenance records | 3 to 5 years | State rules |
| Payroll records | 3 years | 29 CFR 516.5 |
| OSHA 300 logs and 301 reports | 5 years after the calendar year, if you must keep them | 29 CFR 1904.33(a) |
| Temperature and cooling logs | No federal period | Food Code is silent |
| Date marking records | No record required | Food Code 3-501.17 marks the food |
| Employee health agreements | No period | Food Code 2-103.11 |
| Pest control reports | No legal period for the restaurant | Audit practice only |
The rest of this article explains the rows that surprise people.
Food safety records
Temperature, cooling and cooking logs
No retention period. No requirement to keep the log.
Sections 3-501.14, 3-501.15 and 3-501.16 set performance standards. Cooked food cools from 135°F to 70°F within two hours and to 41°F within a total of six. Hot holding at 135°F, cold at 41°F. None of them asks for a record, and Chapter 8 contains no retention period for them either.
The one nearby exception is time as a public health control, which requires written procedures kept in the establishment and available on request. Procedures, not logs, and no period stated.
What operators get wrong. Treating a number as federal law. If someone tells you ninety days, ask where it came from. Your local health department may have its own rule. Your insurer may want longer. Your franchisor almost certainly has a standard, and a third party audit scheme will have one. None of those is the Food Code.
The practical answer for most operators is one year, because it covers a full audit cycle and any seasonal pattern, and because it costs nothing to keep a digital record that long.
Date marking
No retention period, because no record is required.
Section 3-501.17 requires the food to be marked, not a log to be kept. Ready to eat food held more than 24 hours gets a date, the day of preparation counts as day one (for a commercially packaged food, the day the container is opened), and the food is used or thrown away within seven days at 41°F or below.
What operators get wrong. Building a date marking log, then asking how long to keep it. The Code never asked for one. A log here is a management tool, which is a fine reason to have it, but not a record with a retention obligation.
Shellfish tags
90 calendar days, in chronological order.
The 2022 edition renamed Section 3-203.12 “Molluscan Shellfish, Maintaining Identification” and added invoices as an acceptable record alongside tags and labels.
The mechanics matter. Tags stay attached to the container until it is empty. The date the last shellfish from that container is sold or served must be recorded on the tag, label or invoice. Then you keep it for 90 calendar days from that date, in a system that keeps them in chronological order.
What operators get wrong. Two things, both common. Nobody writes the date the container was emptied, which makes the 90 day clock impossible to check and is the violation in itself. And the tags go in a shoebox, which fails the chronological order requirement even if every tag is present.
Raw fish served undercooked
90 calendar days beyond service or sale.
Section 3-402.12 requires the person in charge to record the freezing temperature and time for fish that needs parasite destruction, and to keep those records for 90 calendar days beyond the time of service or sale. If you serve sushi, ceviche or crudo, this applies.
Cook chill and sous vide
6 months. Section 3-502.12 covers reduced oxygen packaging, and paragraph (D)(3)(b) requires records held for at least six months.
This is the only operational log in the Food Code with a retention period attached, which shows how silent the rest of the Code is.
HACCP plan records
Required to exist. No period set.
Section 8-201.14 requires the plan to list the records the person in charge will keep. Section 8-103.12 requires those records to be available on request. Neither says for how long.
What operators get wrong. Assuming the Code supplies the number. It does not. The number lives in the plan your regulatory authority approved. If your plan does not state one, you have an open ended obligation with no defensible destruction date, and the fix is at the plan level rather than the log level.
What the 2026 Food Code changes
The FDA released the 2026 edition of the Food Code in September 2026. Its summary of changes lists no change to any retention period. It does add two things worth planning for. Section 2-501.11 becomes “Employee Illness Policy Documentation”, so a written employee illness policy has to be kept and available, with no period set. And a new Section 8-201.15 sets out when a food safety management system is required. Neither applies until your state adopts the 2026 edition, and each state does that on its own schedule.
FSMA 204 traceability records
2 years from the date the record was created or obtained, under 21 CFR 1.1455(d). Records must be produced to the FDA within 24 hours of a request, or a longer time the FDA agrees to.
The original compliance date was 20 January 2026. The FDA proposed moving it to 20 July 2028, and Congress, in a 2026 appropriations act, directed the FDA not to enforce the rule before that same date. The FDA’s food traceability page says it intends to comply with that direction.
- August 2025The FDA proposes moving the 20 January 2026 compliance date by 30 months
- 2026 appropriations actCongress directs the FDA not to enforce the rule before 20 July 2028
- 20 July 2028The earliest the rule can be enforced
Many smaller restaurants are outside the rule anyway. It does not apply to restaurants and retail food establishments whose average annual value of food sold or provided over the previous three years is $250,000 or less, adjusted for inflation. Restaurants also generally do not assign traceability lot codes.
What operators get wrong. Reading the rule as only about lot codes. If you buy food directly from a farm, the rule asks you to keep the farm’s name and address for 180 days, and that record falls under the same 2028 date as the rest of the rule. Your ordinary receiving records still matter now.
FSMA preventive controls records
2 years under 21 CFR 117.315, and it almost certainly does not apply to you.
The preventive controls requirements in Part 117 apply to facilities that must register with the FDA, and 21 CFR 1.226 exempts restaurants and retail food establishments from registration.
What operators get wrong. Copying a two year FSMA retention policy off a food manufacturing blog. Right number, wrong regulation. You only land inside it if you run a separate manufacturing or commissary arm that registers as a facility, for example bottling a sauce for wholesale.
Employee health agreements
No retention period, and the form is not required either.
Section 2-103.11 requires that employees be informed in a verifiable manner of their duty to report certain illnesses. The FDA’s employee reporting agreement is a model form, not a mandate.
The requirement is the phrase “in a verifiable manner”. The signed form is simply the easiest way to prove you met it, so keep it for the duration of employment.
Certification records
No Food Code period. State law usually requires the record to be current and on the premises, not kept for years.
California requires food facilities to keep records showing that each food handler holds a valid card and to produce them on request. Texas requires a certificate of completion for each food employee to be kept on premises.
What operators get wrong. Filing expired cards while the current one is missing. The obligation is currency and availability, not history.
Facility and maintenance records
Hood and exhaust cleaning
NFPA 96 requires a written report from the cleaning company. How long you keep it comes from your local fire code.
After a cleaning, the contractor attaches a service label to the hood and gives you a written report that should list any areas that were not cleaned or could not be reached. Some fire codes set a three year period for these records, others say nothing, so check the code your fire marshal enforces. Our hood and exhaust cleaning checklist covers what to check before you sign off.
What operators get wrong. Keeping the sticker and throwing away the report. The sticker is not the record. The report is, and its list of areas the cleaner could not reach is the document that decides a claim after a fire.
Fire suppression and extinguishers
A six month service interval for the suppression system, and records commonly kept three years. The International Fire Code requires records of all inspections, tests and maintenance of fire protection systems to be kept on the premises for at least three years (Section 901.6.2 in older editions, 901.6.3 in newer ones). States change this when they adopt the code: Ohio, for example, requires the records for the life of the installation.
NFPA 10 sets what a fire extinguisher record must contain but no retention period. The monthly extinguisher inspection is your job, not the vendor’s, recorded with a date and initials.
What operators get wrong. Treating the tag as the record. A fire official asking for three years of service reports is not asking about the tag, and it is the pattern across reports that shows a recurring fault nobody fixed.
Grease traps
Municipal. Three years is typical. Houston says five.
There is a federal backstop behind the three years. EPA pretreatment rules at 40 CFR 403.12(o) require industrial users that report under them to keep monitoring records, including best management practice records, for at least three years.
Los Angeles requires three years for monitoring records. Austin requires grease trap manifests to be kept on site for three years. Houston asks generators to keep both their copy and the returned copy of each manifest on site for five years, and to get the returned copy back from the hauler within 15 days of the pump out. Our grease trap cleaning and maintenance checklist keeps the pump outs on schedule.
What operators get wrong. Assuming the hauler keeps it for you. In Houston the restaurant holds both copies. This is the row that varies most by city, so check your own rather than trusting a number.
Backflow, elevators and pest control
Backflow test reports are set by state drinking water rules, and the legal duty often sits with the water utility rather than with you. In Washington, for example, the utility keeps test records for five years. Practically, keep your last two annual reports on site, because that is what gets you through an inspection.
Elevator maintenance records are typically three to five years. Georgia requires three years, and five for the five year test, kept at the location, with a printed copy on site even when the elevator company keeps everything electronically.
Pest control reports carry no legal retention period for the restaurant. Federal pesticide recordkeeping covers restricted use pesticides and sits with the applicator, and state pest control rules vary. But the report is one of the first documents a third party auditor asks for, and the first thing a lawyer asks for after a rodent complaint. Keep two years anyway.
Employment records
Payroll records, three years, under 29 CFR 516.5, which requires employers to keep payroll records for at least three years.
OSHA 300 logs, the annual summary and 301 incident reports, five years after the end of the calendar year they cover, under 29 CFR 1904.33(a), and the stored log must be updated for new information. Most restaurants do not have to keep them at all: full-service and limited-service restaurants are on OSHA’s list of partially exempt industries, and so is any employer with 10 or fewer employees, unless OSHA or the Bureau of Labor Statistics asks in writing.
Is there one rule that covers everything?
No, and that is the point. There is no single federal rule setting a blanket retention period for restaurant records. What you have instead is the Food Code, which is mostly silent, a fire code that commonly sets three years for fire protection systems, a city sewer rule, a state drinking water rule, federal employment rules, and whatever your franchisor and your insurer require on top.
Third party audit schemes are often stricter than any of it, which is why audit driven operators keep more than the law requires. That is a reasonable choice, but make it knowingly.
The practical policy
If you want one rule that keeps you safe almost everywhere, keep operational and facility records for three years and shellfish tags for exactly 90 days in date order. Three years covers the common fire code period, grease manifests in most cities and payroll. Check the few local rules that ask for longer, such as Houston’s five years for grease manifests.
The harder part is not the time period. It is being able to produce the right document on the day somebody asks, which for most operators means finding a binder, then finding the right month in the binder, then discovering that the month is incomplete because the person who kept it left in March.
That is the problem MaintainIQ was built around. Checks are recorded as the work happens rather than written up afterwards, with the name of whoever submitted each one and the time, so digital temperature logs and daily checklists show what actually happened. Hood cleaning, fire suppression service and pest control can be set up as recurring jobs with the vendor who does them, next to the vendor and equipment records they belong to. Licenses, permits, certificates and service reports go in the document library instead of a drawer. When an inspector asks for ninety days of anything, you pick the date range and export it. It is a checklist and compliance app for restaurants and multi-location operators that works just as well for a single kitchen, and you can see how it fits restaurant operations.
Sources
- FDA Food Code 2022, sections 2-103.11, 3-203.12, 3-402.12, 3-501.14 to 3-501.17, 3-502.12, 8-103.12 and 8-201.14
- FDA, Summary of Changes in the 2026 Food Code
- 21 CFR 1.1305, 1.1345, 1.1455 and 1.226; 21 CFR 117.315
- 40 CFR 403.12(o)
- 29 CFR 516.5, 29 CFR 1904.1, 1904.33 and Appendix A to Subpart B of Part 1904
- 7 CFR Part 110 (restricted use pesticide records)
- International Fire Code section 901.6, as adopted by your state (for example Ohio Admin. Code 1301:7-7-09)
- Los Angeles Municipal Code 64.30, City of Austin grease trap guidance, Houston Health Department special waste guidance
- Washington Administrative Code 246-290-490
- Georgia Rules and Regulations 120-3-25-.06
- California Health and Safety Code 113948, Texas Administrative Code Title 25 section 228.31
Frequently asked questions
How long do I legally have to keep temperature logs?
There is no federal period, and the FDA Food Code does not require the logs to exist. Any number you have been given comes from your health department, insurer, franchisor or audit scheme. One year is a sensible default if nobody sets a number.
How long do I keep shellfish tags?
90 calendar days from the date the last shellfish from that container was sold or served, kept in chronological order. Write that date on the tag, label or invoice, or the 90 day clock cannot be checked.
Does FSMA apply to my restaurant?
The food traceability rule is likely to, and Congress has directed the FDA not to enforce it before 20 July 2028. Restaurants whose average annual value of food sold or provided is $250,000 or less (adjusted for inflation) are exempt. The preventive controls rule almost certainly does not apply, because restaurants are exempt from facility registration.
Do restaurants have to keep OSHA 300 logs?
Usually not. Full-service and limited-service restaurants are on OSHA's list of partially exempt industries, and employers with 10 or fewer employees are exempt too, unless OSHA or the Bureau of Labor Statistics asks in writing. If you do keep them, the period is five years after the end of the calendar year.
What is the safest single retention period?
Three years for operational and facility records covers the common fire code period, grease trap manifests in most cities and payroll. Shellfish tags remain a separate 90 day rule, and some cities and states ask for longer, such as five years for grease manifests in Houston.
Can I keep records digitally?
Generally yes, and for most records that is now the norm. Watch the exceptions in your own state, for example Georgia, which requires a printed copy of elevator records on site even when the service company keeps them electronically.