Setting up backups is one of the most important parts of handling a WordPress website. It not only helps you in protecting your website’s data but also proves to be a savior in the case of data loss. Hence, you need to have a safe and reliable backup of your website data to prevent any damage to your site, in case of failure.
Before we discuss more about the backup of your WordPress website, it is necessary that you familiarize yourself with some basic things. The WordPress installation consists of two parts –
- The database where your content is stored
- Files which make up your WordPress site
If your database gets corrupted or erased, there is a risk of losing all the data. In such cases, it is the backup that can help restore the data and get your website back on track.
Similarly, you need to have a backup of your files that contain plugins, themes, all media files uploaded to the website to prevent any damage if someone hacks your files and deletes them.
Now, to know the mechanism of data backups, here is a step-by-step guide explaining the different ways and processes of backing up your site.
- Automatic
As the name suggests, automatic backups of the WordPress website happen on their own. They can be done on server level as many WordPress hosting providers offer automatic backups as a part of their services. Some premium hosting providers also give you extra benefits and features that make backing up and restoring more convenient by using services such as CodeGuard which specialize in automated website backups on the cloud.
- Plugins
Another way to easily back up your WordPress website is by using plugins. BackupBuddy is one such plugin that helps you in downloading your backup zip files. It also helps to restore WordPress sites, if any issue arises. Follow these steps to take a backup using this plugin:
- Install and activate the BackupBuddy plugin using the normal WordPress plugin installation methods.
- Run a complete backup of the website by going to Backups page and click the (Full) Complete Backup button. Download the zip file of the backup by clicking “Download backup file” button.
- Choose a remote destination to store your backups. You can do this by navigating to Remote Destinations page. BackupBuddy supports various remote destinations such as WordPress backup to Dropbox and WordPress backup to Google Drive.
- Now, set up backup schedules for automatic backups. Go to BackupBuddy > Schedules page to choose the backup intervals and location to store the backups. After you have set up the schedules, the plugin can do automatic backups accordingly.
BackupBuddy also gives you the benefit of restoring your backup when needed. To restore a backup, you just need to have access to the server to upload the backup zip file and BackupBuddy’s ImportBuddy tool. Once you import both files, navigate to your site’s URL/importbuddy.php. For instance, if your website URL is mysite.com, you need to go to http://www.mysite.com/importbuddy.php. After this, just start the import process, and the ImportBuddy tool will finish the restoring process.
- Through host and phpMyAdmin
Though automatic backups are amazing, you may need to save some other copies of your WordPress website in other places. To do this task, you can log in to your website with an FTP client such as FileZilla and backup your wp-content folder. Just connect to your host with the FTP information and select the public_html directory from the right pane. Now, download the wp-content folder and save it to a suitable location.
Aside from backing up your files through your host, you should also backup your database through phpMyAdmin. This is quite a simple option to manually backup your WordPress website. Follow the listed steps to backup your website –
- Open your phpMyAdmin panel and Click on “Databases”. Go to the database that contains your WordPress data.
- Then select “Export” and click on the “Custom” Method.
- Select all the tables and click “Save output to a file”. Now, choose “None” for “Compression.”
- Choose “SQL” in the format drop-down menu.
- Check “Add Drop Table” and “If Not Exists.”
- Finally, click “Go” to save the data to your computer. Always keep your files in separate places safely.
It also allows you to restore the data either by creating a new database or by importing your backup to the existing database.
Once you have read these steps, you can easily perform your backups. Also, remember that although you have automatic backups, it’s advisable to have another way too that can restore your data in case of emergency. Backup is one of the important steps you should take to secure your website. Hence, you must not take any chances with it and perform backup at regular intervals.