How to Backup a WordPress Site for Free (Using UpdraftPlus)

A security breach, malware attack, human error, or wrong updates can put your website into trouble. If it happens, you may lose all of your work. So, that’s why backing up your site is the most important part of website maintenance.

Wondering how to backup a WordPress site for free? 

Then look no further than the UpdraftPlus plugin. Because it’s an easy-to-use and highly-rated backup plugin with more than 3 million active installations.  

It doesn’t only allow you to take manual backups, but you can also schedule automated backups. On top of that, you can store backups to remote locations and restore a backup at any time with a few mouse clicks. 

Let’s discuss how to do that!

How to Backup a WordPress Site for Free Using UpdraftPlus?

As discussed above, we’re going to use the free version of the UpdraftPlus plugin. So, firstly, we’re going to show you how to install and activate it. 

After that, we will walk you through the steps for backing up a site and restoring backups using the UpdraftPlus. 

Step 1: Install and Activate the UpdraftPlus Plugin 

Log in to your WordPress dashboard and navigate to Plugins > Add new. 

Now, enter UpdraftPlus in the search bar. Once you will see it, click on the Install Now button and then Activate it.

Step 2: Navigate to UpdraftPlus Dashboard 

Once installed and activated, next you need to set up the UpdraftPlus plugin. To do so, navigate to Settings > UpdraftPlus Backups from the left navigation bar. 

This will bring you to the UpdraftPlus backup/restore page. From here you can customize all settings and take backup or restore as per your needs. 

As discussed earlier, with the free UpdraftPlus plugin you can take manual backups as well as schedule automated backups. 

So, let’s first see how to take manual backups. 

Step 3: Backup Manually 

With UpdraftPlus, taking a manual backup is very easy. All you need to do is click the Backup Now button once you’re on the main dashboard page. 

Next, it will ask you to choose what you want to include. 

By default, both database and files are selected. So, you can leave the first two options checked to take a full backup. 

The third option is to store your backup in a remote location. So, if you want to send this backup to a remote location, then keep this option checked.

Lastly, you can set this backup to be deleted only manually. So, if you don’t want to delete this backup automatically when the retention limit is exceeded, then make sure to check this option as well. 

After that, hit the Backup Now button and it will start backing up your site. It may take a few minutes based on the database size.

You can check the backup under the Existing Backups section on the main dashboard page once it is finished.

Step 4: Schedule Automatic Backups

There are chances that you may forget to take manual backups regularly. And meanwhile, if something goes wrong with your website, then you may lose your hard work. 

So, to save yourself from this trouble, consider scheduling automatic backups. For this, navigate to theSettings tab from the main dashboard of UpdraftPlus. 

From here, you can Set up a Schedule that works best for your site. You can either choose an hourly, daily, or monthly schedule for backing up files and databases. 

Usually, it depends on how frequently you update your site. And, accordingly, you can set the schedule to save the latest copy. 

For example, if you make changes very frequently, then choose an hourly or daily schedule for backup. Otherwise, you can pick up weekly or monthly options. 

Next, you can tell how many previous backups you want to keep. For example, if you set it to 5, then it will retain the 5 new backups and override with old ones. 

Next, UpdraftPlus allows you to Choose the Remote Location for storing the backup.

With the free version, you can send a backup to only one remote location, and for sending backups to multiple remote locations, consider using UpdraftPlus premium. 

Tap on the location icon which you want to select as remote storage. For the sake of this tutorial, we’re selecting Google Drive. 

Once you will select the remote location, make sure to Complete Authentication. Based on the selected remote location, authentication instructions may vary. 

In this tutorial, we’ve selected Google Drive as a remote location. So, we have an authentication link to complete the integration. So, as per your remote location, you can follow the instructions given in this section.

Next, you can choose the files which you want to back up. It’s great to back up all plugins, themes, and uploads. But, you can also add an exclusion rule if you want to exclude anything from the backup.

Check the box next to Email and you will receive an email notification whenever any automated backup is done. (Note: Email will be sent to the site admin only).

Once you’re happy with scheduling settings, click Save Changes from the bottom of the page. 

How To Restore Backups Using UpdraftPlus?

Now you know how to take manual backups or schedule automated backups using the Free UpdraftPlus plugin. 

So, how will you restore a backup when you need it?

Well, it’s not much hard as it just needs a few mouse clicks. Here is how to do that:

Once you’re on the main dashboard of the UpdraftPlus plugin, scroll the page until the Existing Backups section. 

Here you can see all the backups, including backup data, and an option to restore and delete that backup.

Find the backup which you want to restore and click the Restore button next to it. 

Now, choose the Components which you want to restore from the backup and click Next. You can either select specific components or select all the components to restore the entire backup.

After that, it will start retrieving backup from the remote location. Once the backup is retrieved, follow the given instructions. And finally, click the Restore button again. 

Once the backup is successfully restored, you will receive a notification on your screen. This is how you can easily restore backups using UpdraftPlus. 

Conclusion 

No matter whether your site is small or big, backup is necessary. The quick and easiest way for backing up a WordPress site for free is by using a plugin like UpdraftPlus. 

With the free UpdraftPlus plugin, you can take manual backups, schedule automated backups, set up one remote location, and restore backups with a few mouse clicks. 

To add more backup functionalities, you can try the premium version of the UpdraftPlus plugin. Here are the key benefits of it:

• Send backups to multiple remote locations. 
• Set exact times to create or delete backups. For e.g., schedule backup at 12.00 am or any other time slot when your site has low traffic.
• Set up incremental backup to back up only changes which are made after the last backup. Such as a new image or post.
• Automatically back up your site before plugin, theme, or WordPress updates. Because sometimes wrong updates can break your site. 
• Easily clone and migrate WordPress site with built-in UpdraftPlus migrator. 
• Allows you to back up non-WordPress files and databases as well.
• WP-CLI support, additional remote storage locations, reporting, and many more advanced features.