Sometimes — but it’s complicated, unreliable, and usually temporary. Erasing a memory is generally not possible.
Details you should know
Hypnosis itself does not reliably create permanent, selective forgetting in the way movies show. It can influence attention, memory retrieval, and the subjective sense of remembering, but it rarely erases a memory.
Under hypnosis people can: have reduced access to a memory (can’t recall it while hypnotized), experience altered vividness or emotional tone of a memory, or be given a suggestion to not think about or to “forget” a specific thing. Those effects can persist after hypnosis but are often partial and reversible.
Hypnosis can produce false memories or confident confabulations if suggestions encourage fabrication. That means instead of truly erasing something, hypnosis can make someone believe something different (including forgetting or misremembering). This is why hypnosis for forensic use (e.g., police interviews) is controversial and usually discouraged.
The strongest, most reliable hypnotic effects are on attention, perception, and suggestion-driven behaviors (e.g., temporary amnesia for a particular event during the hypnotic session). Permanent, selective erasure of a memory is not something hypnosis can be trusted to deliver.
When it might "work"
Temporary hypnotic amnesia: A clinician suggests you won’t remember a specific event or detail while under hypnosis. You may indeed fail to recall it during the session and sometimes shortly afterward.
Post-hypnotic suggestion: The clinician suggests you will not think about a memory or will forget it after the session. This can reduce intrusions or distress, but is variable and may wear off.
Emotional dampening: Hypnosis can reduce the emotional intensity of a memory, which often makes it feel less salient and easier to avoid — functionally similar to “forgetting” for daily life.
Hypnosis combined with therapy (e.g., exposure, reconsolidation-focused work) may reduce the impact of traumatic memories, but that’s different from deleting the memory.
Risks and important cautions
Suggestibility: Highly suggestible people are more likely to have memory changes, including false memories. That can be harmful.
Forensic danger: Hypnosis can contaminate memories; courts and many professional guidelines warn against using hypnosis to recover witness memories.
Incomplete or temporary relief: Memories suppressed under suggestion often return later, sometimes stronger.
Ethical and legal issues: A clinician should get informed consent, explain limits and risks, and not promise permanent erasure.
If you’re asking because of trauma, intrusive memories, or wanting to stop thinking about something
Safer, evidence-based options exist: trauma-focused therapies (e.g., trauma-focused CBT, EMDR), acceptance and commitment therapy, cognitive techniques for reducing rumination, and medication when appropriate.
Hypnosis can be an adjunct to therapy for reducing distress or changing the emotional response, but it’s rarely recommended as a stand-alone way to make a memory permanently disappear.