Archive Empty Pages in Notion Database Daily

Overview

This workflow automatically cleans up your Notion workspace by archiving pages that are completely empty — pages with no text content in any block and no filled property values. It runs daily at 2 AM, so you can keep your databases tidy without manual effort. The workflow is especially useful for removing unwanted placeholder pages, blank templates, or accidentally created empty entries.

Workflow Steps

Here is every node in the workflow, its type, authentication method, and configured parameters:

1. Every day @ 2am (Cron Trigger) — No auth

   • Runs the workflow once per day at 2:00 AM.
   • No configuration needed beyond the trigger time.

2. Get All Databases (Notion) — Notion API (API Key or OAuth2)

   • Resource: database
   • Operation: getAll
   • Return All: true
   • Fetches a list of all databases the Notion integration can access.

3. Get All Database Pages (Notion) — Notion API (API Key or OAuth2)

   • Resource: databasePage
   • Operation: getAll
   • Return All: true
   • Database ID: taken from {{$json["id"]}} (the database ID from the previous node)
   • Retrieves every page in each database, including its properties.

4. Check for empty properties (Function Node) — No auth

   • Function Code: Iterates over each page’s properties. If any property has data (non‑empty array), it sets toDelete = false. If all properties are empty, it sets toDelete = true.
   • This is a custom JavaScript function that marks pages with no filled properties for potential deletion.

5. If Empty Properties (IF Node) — No auth

   • Condition: {{$json["toDelete"]}} equals true
   • Routes only pages that have no filled properties to the next step for block‑level checking.

6. SplitInBatches (Split In Batches Node) — No auth

   • Batch Size: 1
   • Processes one page at a time, ensuring each page’s blocks are inspected independently.

7. Get Page Blocks (Notion) — Notion API (API Key or OAuth2)

   • Resource: block
   • Operation: getAll
   • Return All: true
   • Block ID: taken from {{$json["id"]}} (the page ID)
   • Retrieves all content blocks (text, headings, lists, etc.) inside the page.

8. Process Blocks (Function Node) — No auth

   • Function Code: For each block, it checks if the block’s text array is empty. If all blocks have empty text, it marks the page for deletion. If any block has non‑empty text, it stops and marks the page as not to delete.
   • Returns an object with toDelete (boolean) and pageID (the page’s ID).

9. If toDelete (IF Node) — No auth

   • Condition: {{$json["toDelete"]}} equals true
   • Only pages that are confirmed empty (both properties and blocks) continue to archiving.

10. Archive Page (Notion) — Notion API (API Key or OAuth2)

    • Resource: page
    • Operation: archive
    • Page ID: taken from {{$json["pageID"]}}
    • Moves the empty page to the trash/archive, removing it from active views.

Setup Instructions

To use this workflow, you need:

• A Notion account with access to the databases you want to clean.
• A Notion Integration (API token). Go to https://www.notion.so/my-integrations, create a new integration, and copy the “Internal Integration Secret” (API key).
• In Notion, share each database with your integration (click “Share” in the database top‑right, add the integration by name).
• In n8n, add a Notion credential (type: Notion API) and paste your integration token.
• Enable the workflow and it will run daily at 2 AM. You can adjust the cron trigger to any schedule you prefer.

Use Cases & Variations

• Weekly cleanup — Change the cron trigger to run weekly instead of daily (e.g., every Monday at 9 AM).
• Specific databases only — Modify the “Get All Databases” node to filter by a specific database ID if you only want to clean one database.
• Archive versus delete — The workflow archives (soft delete). To permanently delete, change the Notion operation to “delete” (but be careful — this cannot be undone).
• Exclude certain properties — Edit the “Check for empty properties” function to ignore specific property types (e.g., “created_time” or “last_edited_time”).
• Send a notification — Add a Slack or email node after archiving to report how many pages were cleaned each run.
• Only check top‑level blocks — The current code checks all blocks recursively. If you want only the first block, adjust the loop.

{
  "id": 115,
  "name": "Archive empty pages in Notion Database",
  "nodes": [
    {
      "name": "Get All Databases",
      "type": "n8n-nodes-base.notion",
      "position": [
        240,
        300
      ],
      "parameters": {
        "resource": "database",
        "operation": "getAll",
        "returnAll": true
      },
      "credentials": {
        "notionApi": {
          "id": "36",
          "name": "Notion account"
        }
      },
      "typeVersion": 2
    },
    {
      "name": "Get All Database Pages",
      "type": "n8n-nodes-base.notion",
      "position": [
        420,
        300
      ],
      "parameters": {
        "simple": false,
        "options": {},
        "resource": "databasePage",
        "operation": "getAll",
        "returnAll": true,
        "databaseId": "={{$json[\"id\"]}}"
      },
      "credentials": {
        "notionApi": {
          "id": "36",
          "name": "Notion account"
        }
      },
      "typeVersion": 2
    },
    {
      "name": "Get Page Blocks",
      "type": "n8n-nodes-base.notion",
// ... truncated (copy to see full JSON)