How often should you back-up your data?

Losing data and claiming it back 

You need to consider how much data you're willing to lose - 15 minutes? 1 day? 1 week?

How quickly do you need/want it all back?

Those are the main questions you need to answer before you start looking at backup solutions.

Storage

You need to ensure you have the right amount of storage available in case disaster strikes and you only have data from 6 months ago.

Different types of back-ups

There are many types of back-ups but these are the main two:

Full back-ups –  Complete copy of all data available. Meaning minimal RTO (downtime) however, a full backup would take longer and require more storage space.

Incremental back-ups – only back-up the changes since the last backup. This can be run as often as it is needed and less storage required.

Disaster recovery plan

Backups may be required for a lot of reasons, such as experiencing water damage but generally, they are closely linked to your Disaster Recovery Plan.

The two main elements you need to include in your Disaster Recovery Plan is your Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and Recovery Time Objective (RTO.)

RPO: Your RPO is the point at which your business could function without recent data. E.g. could your business survive without data from the last week or a few hours? 

RTO: Your RTO is how much downtime you will allow for the recovery of the data after the disruption.

General advice

Most businesses tend to do one full backup a week and incremental backups on a daily basis but ultimately the decision needs to come down to our initial question to you: How much data are you willing to lose?

Get in touch today to discuss back-up options for your data.