Monthly

Find Slack channels nobody uses anymore

Once a month you get a list of channels that have gone quiet, so you can archive them.

Runs: Monthly
Apps: Slack
AI: Not needed
Access: channels:read, channels:history (plus channels:manage, chat:write to act)

Send this to your assistant

Create a ClickRuntime automation: on the 1st of every month, list the public Slack channels with no messages in the last 90 days and email me the list.

Paste it into your assistant. It tells you what it will send or change before it runs live.

Add to ChatGPT Add to Claude

First time? Adding ClickRuntime to your assistant takes about two minutes.

Why use it

Why teams use this automation

Slack workspaces grow messy. A project ends, a launch channel is never used again, a vendor channel goes quiet, and a year later the sidebar lists two hundred channels that people have to scroll past. New hires join #proj-atlas-2022 and wonder if anything is happening. Test bots post status messages nobody reads, and admins spend an afternoon scrolling to decide which channels are dead before a security review asks who still has access to what.

On the first of each month, ClickRuntime lists the channels in your workspace, checks the date of the latest message in each, and sends you a report of channels with no activity for the period you set. If you ask for it, it can also archive empty channels or remove old bot messages that match a filter, always with the change shown first.

Workspace admins and IT teams use it most, particularly at companies that need to show regular access reviews.

What you get out of it

The sidebar stops growing endlessly
Retiring channels that nobody has touched in six months makes the useful ones easier to find, and new employees are no longer asked to guess which of two similarly named channels is current.
Old access is not left lying around
A dead channel can still hold shared links, customer names or credentials pasted long ago. Archiving it reduces the places sensitive history sits, and a monthly list keeps that from being forgotten.
Audits have evidence to show
A dated report of inactive channels and what was done with them is a record for a SOC 2 or ISO review, replacing the one-off screenshot an admin collects the week before an auditor arrives.
Admin time is spent on decisions
Finding quiet channels by scrolling is slow and error-prone. With the list delivered, the admin only has to decide which ones to archive, which takes minutes and happens every month.
Bot noise is cleaned up on schedule
Test integrations and retired alert bots leave thousands of messages that bury real conversation in search. Clearing messages that match a filter keeps results useful without deleting what people wrote.

How it works

What happens, step by step

Once a month ClickRuntime goes through the public Slack channels it has been added to.
For each one it looks at the date of the most recent message.
Channels with no messages in the last 90 days go on the list, together with how many members they have.
The list is emailed to you so you can decide which channels to archive.

Before it runs live

Connect Slack, then invite the app to the channel (type /invite @ClickRuntime there)

What you get

RunsMonthly

Find Slack channels nobody uses anymoretoday, 9:00Succeeded

Email · 4 quiet Slack channelsNo messages in 90 days: #launch-2025 (12 members) #acme-pilot (5 members)

Build your own

Need it to work differently?

This template is a starting point. Copy the prompt and change it, or describe a different automation from scratch, with your own conditions, more apps or an AI step. Your assistant writes it, tests it and runs it on ClickRuntime.

Your own rules
Conditions, thresholds, filters and exceptions, written the way you'd explain them to a colleague.
Any number of apps
One automation can read from one app and update several others. Over 248 apps are ready, and anything with an API works too.
AI where it helps
Summaries, classification, extraction and drafts use ClickRuntime's built-in AI, with no extra key.
On a schedule or on each event
Runs as often as every 5 minutes, or the moment an app sends an event, and keeps track of what it already handled.

Changes you can ask for

Run it at a different time, more or less often, or only on weekdays
Add an AI step, for example to summarize, sort or draft a reply
Add another app, for example also send it to Google Sheets
Combine it with other Slack steps into one automation

Under the hood

The code that runs this automation

This is the Python script that runs each time the automation starts. Your AI assistant writes it for you when you send the prompt, and you allow each step in your assistant. To change how the automation works, describe the change to your assistant and it updates the script for you. For every function it can use, see the script reference.

channel_clean_up_and_inactivity_audit.pyexample

import time
from slack_sdk import WebClient
from clickruntime import on_trigger, credentials, notify

@on_trigger
def run(event):
    slack = WebClient(token=credentials.connection("slack", "work"))
    cutoff = time.time() - 90 * 86400
    quiet, cursor = [], None
    while True:
        page = slack.conversations_list(types="public_channel", exclude_archived=True, limit=200, cursor=cursor)
        for ch in page["channels"]:
            if not ch.get("is_member"):
                continue  # the bot can only read channels it has joined
            msgs = slack.conversations_history(channel=ch["id"], limit=1)["messages"]
            if not msgs or float(msgs[0]["ts"]) < cutoff:
                quiet.append(f"#{ch['name']} ({ch['num_members']} members)")
        cursor = page["response_metadata"].get("next_cursor")
        if not cursor:
            break
    notify.email_me(f"{len(quiet)} quiet Slack channels", "No messages in 90 days:\n" + "\n".join(quiet))
    return {"quiet": len(quiet)}

FAQ

Common questions

How is a channel judged inactive?

It compares the timestamp of the most recent message in each channel against the cutoff you set, such as 90 days. Joins and leaves do not count as activity. Channels with recent messages are left out of the report completely.

Can it delete messages from any channel?

It can remove messages that match a filter you define, for example posts from a retired bot, and only where the Slack token has permission to do so. Deletion is never a default, and the change is shown for approval before it goes live.

Does archiving a channel lose its history?

No. An archived channel in Slack is read-only and stays searchable, and an admin can unarchive it at any time. That is why archiving is a safer cleanup step than deleting, and why the report suggests it first.

What permissions does it need?

channels:read, channels:history (plus channels:manage, chat:write to act). Nothing else in your accounts is used.

Does it need AI?

No. It runs without AI, so it doesn't use your plan's AI allowance.

How many runs does it use?

One run each time it runs (monthly). Checks that find nothing to do and stop right away aren't counted.

Can I change how it works?

Yes. Describe the change to your AI assistant, for example a different schedule, channel or filter. It updates the automation, tests it and tells you what changed.

Every 5 minutes