Backup and snapshot: backing up and restoring data

In the Backup & Snapshot tab of your project, you will find two kinds of backup. Both protect the data in your volumes - each volume individually. Container settings such as image, variables and ports remain unchanged when you restore. The two kinds complement each other:

• Snapshot - quickly back. A frozen state of your volumes stored directly on this server. It can be created and restored in seconds and protects against errors during updates and accidental deletion. A snapshot only occupies space for changed data, but it counts towards your storage quota. It does not help in the event of a server failure.
• Backup - safely off-site. An encrypted copy stored in a separate data centre, created automatically every night. Backups protect against server failure, hardware faults and errors detected too late. You can restore all volumes or a single volume. Backups do not count towards your storage quota and are a bookable option.

You decide which volumes are backed up automatically in the Storage tab (Storage and file browser). By default, all of them are. For data that can be recreated, such as a cache or search index, switch off backups there - this saves space.

Select automatic snapshots

Under Automatic on the Snapshots card, you can specify how often a snapshot is taken:

• Off (default) - no automatic snapshots. We still create one before ‘Back up now’ and before updates.
• Daily - the last 7 are retained. This is sufficient for most projects.
• Every 6 h - the last 8 are retained.
• Hourly - the last 24 are retained. For databases with a high volume of write operations, this takes up a noticeable amount of space.

Automatic snapshots and the nightly backup jointly cover all volumes that are backed up. The amount of space your snapshots currently take up is shown below the selection. Without a booked backup, we recommend at least ‘Daily’.

Creating and deleting snapshots

1. Before making any major changes, click on Create snapshot.
2. Choose the volumes the snapshot should contain. They are grouped by container; all volumes that are backed up are preselected. A volume that is otherwise not backed up can still be selected here.
3. Click Create snapshot in the dialogue. After a few seconds, the snapshot will appear in the restore points as ‘Manual’.

Your own snapshots are retained until you delete them using the bin icon. How many of your own snapshots you can keep depends on the snapshot slots you have booked. Snapshots that we create automatically before changes expire after 7 days. All snapshots can be deleted if you need space.

Restore points

Below the cards, all snapshots and backups are displayed as a timeline organised by day. Each entry lists the volumes it contains and, in brackets, the containers that use them. Use the All, Snapshots and Backups filters to sort the list; older days appear via ‘Show all …’.

Restore to a previous state

You only restore the volumes you select - for example just the database. Only containers that use these volumes are stopped briefly and then started again. All other containers keep running. For security reasons, you confirm the operation by signing in again.

Restore a snapshot

1. Click Restore next to the desired snapshot.
2. Under ‘Which volumes do you want to restore?’, choose the volumes. All volumes of the snapshot are preselected.
3. Click Restore and confirm by signing in again.

The selected volumes return to the state of the snapshot. More recent data in these volumes and newer snapshots of these volumes are removed. Snapshots of the other volumes are kept.

Restore a backup

1. Click Restore next to the desired backup.
2. Select the scope: all volumes of the backup or just a single volume.
3. Click Restore and confirm by signing in again.

Before a backup is restored, the platform automatically creates a precautionary snapshot of the affected volumes. This allows you to revert if you have selected the wrong backup. The restoration process takes a few minutes, depending on the amount of data.