Do you know how to backup your WordPress Website? This is an essential task that one should do at least once a month. Every week is better, especially if you write new content every day.
Imagine waking up one day and finding that your website is gone. What would go through your mind? This could be devastating for you, especially if you have worked on it for years and have hundreds of articles that you have written from scratch. Even worse if your website is a reliable source of income for you.
Luckily if you are a member of Wealthy Affiliate and you host your sites on their platform, the chances of this happening to you are next to nil, as they do regular backups of all the websites hosted on their platform.
Nevertheless one can never be too careful.
For peace of mind, it is always best to know how to backup your WordPress Website, and thankfully, it is much easier than you think.
How To Backup Your WordPress Website
If you have a WordPress website, the job of backing up your website is going to be a breeze.
Let me walk you through the process:
Step 1:
Go to your WordPress Dashboard and click on tools.
Now you should see the drop down menu shown above that says Available Tools, Import, Export, Export Personal Data and Erase Personal Data.
Click on Export.
You will now see the screen below.
Step 2:
Where it says Choose what to export, I normally click on All content. This will back your entire website up. If you only want your posts for instance, then click on posts.
Now click on Download Export File.
The file will go to the same place all your downloads normally go to on your computer.
Step 3:
In order to use your backup should you lose your site altogether, simply go to Tools again and this time export your content.
At the bottom of the list, you would use the WordPress install now option.
How To Backup Your WordPress Website With A Plugin
I don’t use plugins to update my site as I try not to install too many plugins on my site as they affect the speed at which my site loads up. However many of you may prefer to use a plugin to do this job.
The best free plugin to use to backup your WordPress website is called UpDraftPlus.
As you can see UpdraftPlus has a five-star rating and over a million people use it. This data tells you that the plugin is both popular and good. To find this plugin simply type the name in the search bar under add new plugins.
Once you have installed the plugin on your website, you will find it under settings in your dashboard, as you can see from the photo above.
In the main dashboard, UpdraftPlus lets you manually backup your WordPress website at any time. To do so, simply click on the Backup Now button.
To save yourself the trouble to remember to manually backup, UpdraftPlus lets you create your own automatic backup schedule. To set up scheduled backups, select the Settings tab as seen on the photo above.
You can then pick a schedule that you would like to have your website backed up at. It can be anything from every four hours to monthly.
When you are happy with your backup schedule don’t forget to save changes at the bottom of the page.
Under the settings tab, you will also be able to choose where your backup files must be stored. It has a number of options for you ranging from Google Drive to Dropbox to Email. You will simply need to make your choice to set it all up. Sometimes it is a good option to save it on a cloud-based platform, in case your PC decides to crash.
Each storage solution has it’s own set of instructions which you simply follow to get yourself set up. Remember to press Complete setup once you have sorted your backup schedule.
If you ever need to restore your backups, simply click on the Existing Backups tab and choose which one you want to install.
Please feel free to comment below if you have any other suggestions or solutions when it comes down to how to backup your WordPress website.
Thanks for the great article.
I have recently joined Wealthy Affiliate. I am still in the early stages and can see the potential.
I really enjoyed reading this and I could not be silent about your post so I decided to leave my comment here and say thank you for sharing this quality post with others.
Actually, this is exactly the information that I was looking for about How to Backup Your WordPress Website and when I landed on your website and read this post, it answered all my questions in detail.
This is very useful and can definitely be used as a great source for everyone who is interested in finding out how to do this.
I can now backup my website with confidence.
Thanks for stopping by Nasrin and I am glad you learnt something by reading this article.
Hello Michel,
Feeling very glad to read your post. I was very worried about my website security. But I could not know how. You shared a very helpful post for me. In your post you amazingly expressed how to backup websites by including steps. Your writing style is also amazing. I really enjoyed your post and I will follow your post. Did you write any other post about the related topic? If yes. Please tell me. I will be happy to read your another post.
Thanks a lot dude. ☺️
Thanks for your kind words, and no this is the first article that I have written on how to backup your WordPress Website.