Feedback removal is the Top Rated perk that lets a freelancer or agency ask Upwork to remove the feedback from one contract so that it no longer counts towards the profile or the Job Success Score, on a schedule Upwork sets.
Upwork lists feedback removal among the benefits of the Top Rated badge. After a contract ends with feedback the freelancer or agency would rather not carry, they can request its removal within a time limit after the contract closes. Upwork's Help Center states that a successful request removes both the public feedback and the private feedback for that contract from the Job Success Score, and the contract shows on the work history without a review. The request is a one-click process; there is no appeal to argue, and Upwork does not ask the client.
The perk is rationed. Upwork allows it only once in a period and only after a minimum number of contracts since the last use; both limits are set by Upwork and have changed, so the Help Center is the place to check the current ones. Because it is tied to the badge, a profile that loses Top Rated loses the perk with it.
What removal does not do is as important. It does not refund money, reopen a dispute or change what the client wrote on their own side of the contract. It is not available to profiles without the badge, and the ordinary route, asking the client to revise their feedback within Upwork's window, remains open to everyone.
How Upwork Insights uses it
This term describes Upwork's own rules or product rather than a figure the index measures; the pages that do carry live figures are the stats and rate pages.