# Update

## June 19 17:15 GMT

Thank you to everyone who has provided feedback on this feature! We apologize for the frustrating rollout, and especially to power-users maintaining many forecasts who had predictions auto-withdrawn without sufficient warning.

After reviewing your feedback, we’re making some changes.

**Rolling back withdrawal dates on existing predictions**

We're rolling back the withdrawal dates that were automatically set on all your existing predictions. This rollback will happen around 10am GMT tomorrow (June 20, 5am EDT).

**A new simplified approach**

Whatever your account setting is on July 2, we will apply that setting to all your standing predictions made before June 19. To completely opt out (making it as if this feature never affected your existing predictions), simply uncheck "By default, my predictions are withdrawn after a % of the question lifetime" in your settings. Forget about the Google form! Any custom durations you set from June 20 forward will persist as you've configured them.

**More on why we believe this is the best direction**

Based on your feedback, we also want to be clearer about our motivations for auto-withdrawal.

* **Lower barrier to entry**: We want to let forecasters decide upfront how much effort they want to commit to a question, rather than feeling locked into monitoring it indefinitely. We believe this will particularly help new forecasters.
* **Improve competitiveness**: Topping tournaments and leaderboards will be more meaningful. One can’t score well just by beating outdated predictions.

**We’re making a few other changes based on your feedback**

* **Minimum default prediction duration**: You default prediction duration will never be shorter than 1 month, regardless of your account settings. You can always change this manually for any question.
* **Better filtering**: We fixed the "Withdrawn" filter and are adding a "Withdrawing Soon" filter.
* **Improved re-prediction**: Your sliders now remember your last prediction position, making it easier to re-affirm withdrawn predictions with minimal effort. We hope this is especially helpful for numeric questions.

Thanks again!

# Original Announcement

We’ve just launched *prediction auto-withdrawal*, meaning that by default, your predictions will be automatically [withdrawn](https://www.metaculus.com/faq/#howwithdraw) after a set amount of time. When you withdraw from a question, your prediction *up to the point you withdrew* still counts toward your score. And you can always go and re-affirm your previous prediction with a click.

## Why are we doing this?

Auto-withdrawal helps you avoid the silent hit to your score that comes from predictions you’ve forgotten about. It helps ensure that Metaculus stays competitive, by reducing the influence of stale forecasts on both your personal score and the community prediction. While the community prediction is recency-weighted, outdated forecasts can still muddy the waters.

## How it works

By default, your predictions will now expire after **10% of the question’s open lifetime**, unless you select another value when predicting. You can also change the default value in your [settings](https://www.metaculus.com/accounts/settings/), which will only affect forecasts made after the setting change. You’ll get a reminder email some time before your prediction duration runs out. If you don’t update, your prediction will be withdrawn — but you’ll still be able to re-affirm it later if it still reflects your view.

<img height="367" width="523" src="https://metaculus-web-media.s3.amazonaws.com/user_uploaded/image_GrwncEz.png" />  
## What happens to your current predictions?

To help with the transition, we’re assigning scheduled withdrawal dates to all your standing predictions. Given that today is June 18, 2025:

* If your prediction has been standing for **less than 10% of the question’s lifetime**, it will be withdrawn once it reaches that 10% mark.
  *Example: A question opened on January 1 2025 and closes on November 1 2025 (10 months). If you predicted on* June 16, *your prediction will be auto-withdrawn on* July 16.
* If your prediction has been standing for **more than 10% of the question’s lifetime**, it will be withdrawn at the next multiple of that 10%.
  *Example: A question opened on January 1 2025 and closes on November 1 2025 (10 months). If you predicted on* January 5, *your prediction will be auto-withdrawn on* July 5.

## Want to opt out?

Changing your default auto-withdrawal duration settings will only apply to predictions you make after the setting change. If you want all your standing predictions to be set to *“never withdraw,”* respond to [this google form](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSd_boMv6nQeqIdbOhRkVVfb8Ie1B-QofnEmy7mOxljcC2CcAg/viewform?usp=preview) before **July 1** (EDIT: no longer necessary; see update). Note that in the meantime, your predictions may get auto-withdrawn, so check your email notifications. We’ll process the opt-out requests on July 2. If you opt out, this will affect **all your standing predictions as of July 2** when we process your request (i.e. if you set auto-withdrawals between now and then, they will be changed to “never withdraw”).