Backing up your data is one of the most important things you can do to protect yourself from data loss. However, there are some common backup mistakes that can render your backups useless when you actually need them. In this article, I will cover 7 major backup mistakes you should avoid.
Not Having Any Backups
This is the biggest mistake of all. If you don’t have any backups whatsoever, you are leaving yourself completely vulnerable to catastrophic data loss from things like hard drive failures, ransomware attacks, natural disasters, theft, accidental deletion, and more. Not having backups is like not having insurance. When (not if) disaster strikes, you’ll wish you had backups.
As a bare minimum, you should have an external hard drive or cloud backup to safeguard your most important files. Ideally, you’ll use both for onsite and offsite redundancy. The bottom line is: back up your data somehow – anything is better than nothing.
Backing Up Too Infrequently
How often you back up depends on how much new/changed data you generate and how much data you can afford to lose in a worst-case scenario. Backing up too infrequently leaves you exposed to potentially losing a lot of work.
For individual users, I recommend backing up at least every week, if not more often for important active projects. Businesses should back up daily. Configure your backup software to automate backups on a schedule. Manual periodic backups are too easy to skip.
Always back up before major events like OS updates or hardware changes too. The more backups you have, the less data you’ll lose in an emergency.
Not Verifying Backups
Creating backups isn’t enough – you need to verify they worked! There’s no point doing backups if the files are corrupted or unrecoverable.
Periodically restore random files from backup to test recoverability. Verify backup software logs for errors or warnings. Check backup drive SMART stats. Test bare metal restores to new hardware.
Catching backup problems early prevents nasty surprises down the road when you actually need to rely on those backups. Test your backups regularly to ensure they are working.
Reusing Old Media
When your backup drives start to fill up, it’s tempting to delete older backups to make room for new ones. Don’t do this! Reusing the same media leads to only having recent backups.
Instead, invest in new drives to add capacity. Keep older backups archived as recovery points in case you need to go further back.
follow a rotation scheme: Daily (last 7 days), weekly (last 4 weeks), monthly (last 12 months), yearly (last 10 years). Retain multiple generations of backups.
Saving Critical Data Only
While it’s good practice to focus backups on your most important data, don’t make the mistake of only backing up selective files while excluding the OS, apps, and settings.
Doing so leads to an incomplete backup that won’t allow you to properly restore and recreate your full working system. At minimum back up the system state and appropriate recovery points. Ideally, do full system images.
Back up the whole system, not just user files. Otherwise recovery will be limited and require cumbersome reinstallation/reconfiguration.
Using Cloud Storage Alone
Cloud backup services like Dropbox or OneDrive are great supplementary backup tools thanks to their offsite storage and sync features. However, relying solely on cloud backups is risky.
Internet outages could leave you without access to backup your new data. Cloud services have storage limits, so they’re not ideal for full system backups. Upload speeds make initial backup/restores impractical.
Use cloud storage as an additional backup layer, but maintain local backups too. Combine cloud and local storage for robust redundancy.
Backing Up to the Same Drive
This is a common mistake – backing up your data to a different folder or partition on the same physical hard drive. If the drive fails, you lose the original data AND the backups!
Always back up to a physically separate disk. Use external local media or remote cloud storage. The backup destination should be isolated from the source data, so a single failure can’t wipe out both.
Don’t store backups on the same drive as the source data. Keep them physically separate for true redundancy.
The Bottom Line
Avoiding these common backup mistakes helps ensure you have usable, redundancy backups when you need them most. Test and maintain regular, isolated, and generational backups for reliable data protection. Use a combination of local external drives and cloud storage for complete onsite/offsite coverage.
What other backup best practices would you add? Proper preparation prevents poor performance! Let me know your tips in the comments.
