2 Ways to Delete Custom Catalog in ConfigMgr

In this post, I will show you how to delete custom catalog in ConfigMgr using console and PowerShell. Deleting a third-party custom catalog stops synchronization of new updates and removes the approval for catalog signing and update content certificates.

You might choose to delete custom catalogs from SCCM for various reasons, such as no longer needing third-party application updates or discovering a more effective solution for deploying updates such as Patch My PC.

Microsoft recently published a list of supported software update catalogs for Configuration Manager. Some catalogs are freely available, and some catalogs have an additional cost associated with them. Here is the nice post to learn more about the SCCM catalogs for third-party catalogs.

If you have already imported a custom catalog into SCCM earlier, and you wish to delete it, it can be done from Configuration Manager console or via Remove-CMThirdPartyUpdateCatalog PS cmdlet. I am going to demonstrate both these methods now.

Method 1: Delete Custom Catalog using SCCM Console

You must first unsubscribe the catalog before actually deleting it. By unsubscribing you are opting out from receiving the third-party updates provided by the vendor.

To unsubscribe the catalog, launch the Configuration Manager console. Go to Software Library > Software Updates > Third-Party Software Update Catalogs. Right-click the custom catalog that you wish to unsubscribe and click Unsubscribe from Catalog.

You are prompted to confirm if you’re sure you want to unsubscribe. Click Yes.

Unsubscribing from this catalog stops synchronization of new updates and removes the approval for catalog signing and update content certificates. Existing updates are not removed, but you may not be able to deploy them.

This completes the steps to unsubscribe a custom catalog in SCCM.

To delete a custom catalog in ConfigMgr, go to Software Library > Software Updates > Third-Party Software Update Catalogs. Select the custom catalog that you wish to remove and in the top ribbon click Delete Custom Catalog.

You see a confirmation box. Are you sure you want to delete the selected catalog?. Click Yes. This completes the steps to delete the custom catalog from SCCM.

Method 2: Using Remove-CMThirdPartyUpdateCatalog Cmdlet

Microsoft offers a handy PowerShell cmdlet Remove-CMThirdPartyUpdateCatalog to safely remove a third-party software updates catalog.

Launch the Configuration Manager console as an administrator. In the upper-left corner, there’s a blue rectangle. Select the white arrow in the blue rectangle, and choose Connect via Windows PowerShell.

Run the below command force remove the third-party update catalog by its name. Replace the catalog name with the one that you want to remove.

Remove-CMThirdPartyUpdateCatalog -Name "Catalog Name" -Force

Remove-CMThirdPartyUpdateCatalog -Name "Catalog Name" -Force

The below command removes the third-party update catalog as an object.

$catalog = Get-CMThirdPartyUpdateCatalog -Name "Catalog Name"
Remove-CMThirdPartyUpdateCatalog -ThirdPartyUpdateCatalog $catalog

$catalog = Get-CMThirdPartyUpdateCatalog -Name "Catalog Name"
Remove-CMThirdPartyUpdateCatalog -ThirdPartyUpdateCatalog $catalog

Unselect the Products in Software Update Point

In this final step, I will unselect those third-party product updates in SUP that were previously enabled. Deleting a custom catalog in ConfigMgr doesn’t remove the existing updates, you’ll have to manually delete it. Once you delete the catalog you cannot deploy those updates anymore.

For example, I had earlier imported Adobe custom catalog and manually enabled Adobe Reader product in SUP to get the product updates. Since I have deleted the catalog now, I must also uncheck the product from SUP > Products.

In the Software Update Point component properties, go to the Products tab. Under Products > All Products, uncheck all the third-party products that were selected when you imported custom catalogs. Click Apply and OK.

After performing the above steps, perform a SUP synchronization. Once it is complete, you may still find the old third-party application updates in the console. They are marked as ‘Expired‘ by ConfigMgr and you can either delete those updates manually or wait for ConfigMgr to automatically delete them.