diff --git a/source/_components/recorder.markdown b/source/_components/recorder.markdown
index c9ba56e1b97..4a20ef3f296 100644
--- a/source/_components/recorder.markdown
+++ b/source/_components/recorder.markdown
@@ -131,6 +131,10 @@ Call the service `recorder.purge` to start a purge task which deletes events and
 | `keep_days`            |      yes | The number of history days to keep in recorder database (defaults to the component `purge_keep_days` configuration)
 | `repack`               |      yes | Rewrite the entire database, possibly saving some disk space. Only supported for SQLite and requires at least as much disk space free as the database currently uses.
 
+<p class='note'>
+Purging does not necessarily remove all entries before a given date. For example, to be able to recover after startup, the last known state for each entry is never purged. This is true even if the entry is already removed from your configuration.
+</p>
+
 ## {% linkable_title Custom database engines %}
 
 | Database engine | `db_url`                                                 |