{
  "slug": "range-tombstone",
  "term": "Range tombstone",
  "aliases": [
    "range deletion marker"
  ],
  "definition": "A range tombstone is a versioned deletion marker that suppresses covered older keys across an ordered key interval.",
  "note": "RocksDB DeleteRange uses a half-open interval [start, end). A later write can create a visible value inside that interval. The marker is not a synchronous erase of the covered SST bytes.",
  "related": [
    "lsm-tombstone",
    "lsm-tree",
    "sstable"
  ],
  "citations": [
    {
      "id": "delete-range",
      "title": "Abhishek Madan and Andrew Kryczka. DeleteRange: A New Native RocksDB Operation. RocksDB, 21 November 2018.",
      "url": "https://rocksdb.org/blog/2018/11/21/delete-range.html",
      "accessed": "2026-10-12"
    },
    {
      "id": "hesela",
      "title": "LSM tombstones: deleted is not yet reclaimed",
      "url": "https://hesela.com/analyses/lsm-tombstones-delete-persistence/",
      "accessed": "2026-10-12"
    }
  ],
  "status": "shipping",
  "advantages": [],
  "limitations": [],
  "supersedes": [],
  "supersededBy": [],
  "firstSeen": null,
  "lastSeen": null,
  "updated": "2026-10-12"
}