Creating your first backup job — Help

A backup job defines what to back up, where to store it, and when to run. You need at least one server or provider and one storage destination before creating a job.

Job types

VPS Snapshot — creates a snapshot of a Droplet via the DigitalOcean API. No SSH required.
Database — runs pg_dump or mysqldump over SSH and uploads the result to storage.
Docker — archives named Docker volumes and docker-compose files over SSH.

Schedule field

Schedules use standard cron syntax. Some common examples:

0 2 * * *     # Every day at 2:00 AM
0 */6 * * *   # Every 6 hours
0 2 * * 0     # Every Sunday at 2:00 AM
30 1 * * 1-5  # Weekdays at 1:30 AM

Hourly and more-frequent schedules require a Pro plan or higher.

Retention

VPS Snaps tracks which backups belong to each job and automatically deletes old ones beyond your retention setting. The minimum is 1 day; the maximum depends on your plan.

Enabling and disabling

Newly created jobs are enabled by default. You can pause a job at any time from the Backup Jobs list without deleting it. Paused jobs don't run on schedule but can still be triggered manually.