Restore a backup, a single file, or something you deleted

Backups let you put your website back as it was at an earlier moment. You can bring back the whole site, or one file you lost. Deleted websites, databases and DNS zones can also be brought back for a while from Recently deleted.

Turn on backups

1. In your control panel, select My sites, then the website.
2. Open the Backups tab.
3. If the card says No backups yet, select Enable backups. Leave the two boxes empty to use your plan's schedule and how long it keeps snapshots.

Your backups are kept on separate backup servers. The card then shows how often the site is backed up, how long snapshots are kept, and how many there are. It also says when the backup was last restored in a test, to prove it comes back.

Good to know: the Backups page in the control panel menu lists everything that is protected, in one place.

Take a backup now

Before a risky change, select Create backup on the Backups tab. It takes a snapshot straight away and does not change the schedule.

Restore the whole site

1. On the Backups tab, choose a moment under Pick a moment and select Next.
2. Choose Everything — the whole site as it was at that moment and select Next.
3. Read the summary, tick the box to confirm that this overwrites the site's files, and select Restore this moment.

Restore one file

1. Choose a moment and select Next.
2. Choose One file only.
3. Browse the snapshot to the file and select it. If you already know the path, type it instead, for example public_html/wp-content/themes/mytheme/style.css.
4. Select Next, tick to confirm, and select Restore this moment.

Only that file is overwritten. The rest of the site is left as it is.

Your database is backed up separately

A website's backup holds its files. Its database has its own backups. To restore a database:

1. Select Databases in the menu, then the database.
2. Open its Backups tab, pick a moment and select Next.
3. Tick to confirm and select Restore this moment. Restoring overwrites the database's tables.

Mailboxes

If the website has email, the Backups tab also has a card for the domain's mailboxes. You can restore every mailbox, or one mailbox. Restoring a mailbox replaces all of its mail with the snapshot's contents, so anything delivered since that moment is no longer in the mailbox. To rescue a single message, restore into a spare mailbox and copy it across.

Bring back something you deleted

Deleting a website, a database or a DNS zone does not remove it straight away. Each one waits in a Recently deleted list:

• websites: at the bottom of My sites
• databases: on the Databases page
• DNS zones: on the DNS zones page.

Select Restore beside it. The list says when its contents will be removed for good. A restored website comes back with the files it had, but not its certificate: request one from the site's Domains tab once it is serving again.

Good to know: Delete permanently removes it now, and it can no longer be restored.

Related

• Make a WordPress staging copy and publish it
• Create a database and use the database manager
• Upload and manage your website's files
• Support