How to Backup and Restore Your WordPress Site

Creating a website with WordPress is not just by personal preference; it is also one of the most popular ways through which bloggers, business owners, and developers worldwide build their sites. How to Backup and Restore Your WordPress Site. WordPress is extremely easy in managing content, customizing themes, and installing plugins to add more functionality to the site. No matter how strong a site is, accidents do happen. Even with a hacked website, a server crash, or any kind of human error while updating, irreversible damage can be inflicted to content and functionalities.

That is why backing up your WordPress site regularly is important. It will serve as a safety net to your website in case of anything, so you can recover the lost data or restore your site back to its prior functioning. In this article, we shall walk you through everything you need to know about backing up and restoring your WordPress site in a step-by-step manner.

Why Is Backing Up Your WordPress Site Important?

Before we discuss the processes of taking backups and restoring your WordPress website, let’s first check what importance backing up has.

1. Protection against data loss

Data loss could happen anytime whether due to hacking, server crashing, or accidental deletion. However, if you have a backup not older than a week, you can restore your content without missing out on a beat.

2. Protection against hackers

WordPress sites are favorite targets of hackers. An attack leaves a site compromised, damaged, or offline. How to Backup and Restore Your WordPress Site. And a good backup enables the user to get back their site after an attack, with minimum downtime and threat of data loss.

3. Avoidance of Human Error

Updating or installing plugins or doing any kind of theme customizations may lead to errors. With a backup, you could restore your site quickly and get rid of the whoops without starting all over.

4. Updates and Migrations

Whenever one updates the core WordPress files, theme updates, or plugin updates, there is always a chance that something might break. How to Backup and Restore Your WordPress Site.  The backup allows you to put up a safety net during this update or migration, so you can roll back to a stable version in case something went wrong.

5. Peace of Mind

Backing up is where the peace of mind comes in, knowing that by doing this, your site is as good as “insured,” allowing recovery from unforeseen circumstances without a complete loss of all your precious hard work.

Now that you understand the importance of backing up, you can now check how to backup and restore your WordPress website.

How to Backup Your WordPress Site

Backing up a WordPress site is making copies of site files and databases. You can do this in different ways: manual, plugin-installed, or hosting-provided. Each one is discussed in detail below.

1. Manual Backup

Backup consists of two elements: backing up WordPress files and WordPress database. Doing this is possible using FTP and phpMyAdmin.

Step 1: Back Up WordPress Files Using FTP

The contents of your WordPress site, including its theme files, plugins, media uploads, and other assets, are stored directly in the root directory of your website. Here’s how to back them up:

Step 1.1 Install an FTP Client: Download an FTP client allowing you to connect to the server that hosts your WordPress site. Popular ftp clients include FileZilla, cyberdeck, and transmit. Get it and install any of them.

Thereafter, make your entry into the Server.

Open the FTP client and run the settings. Hostname; username; password, the required parameters usually include the domain name of your service provider without the ‘www.’ bits. These parameters can be obtained from your hosting provider or the cPanel.

Then: Download WordPress Files: After connecting your computer with the Digital Ocean server, visit your installation folder where you install WordPress. It usually carries the name public html or www. All the files and directories download to your local folder. Your wp-content wp-includes, wp-admin folders are just some of them. All other files that save in the root directory are also part of this.

Step 2: Back Up WordPress Database Using phpMyAdmin

Over this trendy world of WordPress, it is a home for content such as posts, pages, comments, and user data-all of which have its own database. The steps to back up the database are.

• Step 2.1: Access phpMyAdmin

Log in to your hosting account and go to cPanel. Look under the “Databases” section for that phpMyAdmin icon and click it.

• Step 2.2: Export Your Database

In phpMyAdmin, click on your WordPress database from the list on the left. Click the “Export” button at the top. With “Quick,” select “SQL”. Click “Go” to download it onto your machine.

2. Using a WordPress Backup Plugin

Backup plugins automate the backup process and enable storing backups in a cloud service: email or local storage, which makes them the easiest and most practical means of backing up your WordPress site.

Popular WordPress Backup Plugins:

• Updraft Plus

Updraft Plus is the most well-known backup plugin downloaded worldwide. The writing is done both when paid and free versions are available. With Updraft Plus, you can now back up your entire Word press site, including files and database, store it in the cloud, like any of Google Drive, Dropbox, or Amazon S3 services.

• Backup Buddy

Backup Buddy is a premium plug-in that helps in total backup with automated backup and migration. It allows the backup to be stored off-site.

• Vault Press

Another nice feature about Vault Press, part of Jetpack, is real-time backup and security scanning, which is what you may look for if you want an easy and trustworthy backup solution.

 Install a Backup Plugin

• You should reach WordPress dashboard of yours.
• You should get ready at Plugins > Add New.
• Search up any backup plugin you want to use, for example, Updraft Plus.
• Click “Install Now” and then “Activate”. Then choose the backup frequencies (daily, weekly, etc.) and specify where to store your backup copies, e.g., Google Drive, Dropbox.
• Choose the parts of your site that you want to be backed up (files and database).
• Write the settings and perform the first backup.

Step 1: Check for Backups in cPanel

• Sign-in to your hosting account and access cPanel.
• Look for the Backup section, where you may see options of creating and restoring backups.

Step 2: Create a Backup

• You can usually create a complete backup of your WordPress site by clicking one button in the Backup area.
• Some hosts provide automatic backups every day, week, or month, while others would require you to create your own manual backups.

 Download or Save Backups

• For some hosts, the backup is stored for you; for others, you may download it to your computer. Remember to always download that copy for safekeeping:

Most of the present web hosting: For example, those are mostly servers: These backups are usually scheduled and restored by just a few click from the hosting dashboard. This is perfect if you would like to avoid getting your hands so.

: Manually carrying out the process of backing up or even using plugins.

 Check for Backups in cPanel

-log into your hosting account and go to cPanel.

-look for the Backup section, where you might find options for creating and restoring backups.

 Create a Backup

-in the Backup section, you usually bring about a full backup of your WordPress site with a single click.

-some hosts provide daily, weekly, or monthly backups, whereas others will require you to perform the backup manually.

 Download or Save Backup

-some hosts take care of backing it up for you, while others allow you to download it directly to your computer. Always ensure you download a copy of the backup for safekeeping.:

Most web hosting service providers have their automated backup features included in the service. These are routinely scheduled and can be restored through a couple of clicks in your hosting dashboard. This is an excellent choice for someone who doesn’t want to deal with the technicalities of manual-site backup or using plugins.

STEP 1: Check for Backups in cPanel log into your hosting account and access cPanel. Look for the Backup section, where you may see options of creating and restoring backups.

Step 2: Create a Backup

So you can usually create a complete backup of your WordPress site by clicking one button in the Backup area.

Some hosts provide automatic backups every day, week, or month, while others would require you to create your own manual backups.

Step 3: Download or Save Backups Some hosts, backup for you while others, and may allow downloading to your computer. Make sure to always download it for safekeeping.

How to Restore Your WordPress Site

Restoring WordPress site from backup, when the site goes corrupt or gets hacked or even faces data loss, will save you. Restoration process largely depends upon the backup method used:

1. Manual Backup to Restore your Site

If you backed up the site manually via FTP and php My Admin, so follow these steps to restore your site’s backup:

Step 1: Upload WordPress Files via FTP.

• So open your FTP client and connect to your server.
• Navigate to Root-directory, where you stored your WordPress files.
• Replace the files on the server with the local backup files.

Step 2: Import the Database via php My Admin

Log into php My Admin and select your WordPress database.

Choose Import from the tabs.

Select the SQL file you backed up earlier and click on “Go”, to restore the database.

So restoring Your Site Using Backup Plugin:

If so you used a plugin like UpdraftPlus or BackupBuddy, restoring your site is a much simpler process. Most backup plugins have a feature of “Restore”, and which automatically restores both the files and the database from your backups.

Step 1: Install the Plugin

• So if the plugin was deactivated, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins, and reactivate it.
• Because if the plugin was deleted, it can now be downloaded from Plugins > Add New.

Step 2: Restore Backup

• Open the settings page of the plugin.
• Click on the “Restore” button and choose the backup file you would like to restore.

3. Restoring from Hosting Provider Backup

If your hosting company gives backups, you can restore your website directly through the control panel of your hosting.

• So Log into the hosting account and look for the Backup section.
• So choose the backup and follow on-screen directions to restore the site.

Best Practices for WordPress Backups

Store Backups Off-Site: So always save up the backup in a location different from the original site; for example, have them on Google Drive, Dropbox or Amazon S3 apart from the original site.

• Multiple Backup Storage: So save as much as some copies of your backup just to be on the safe side if backups are corrupt.

Conclusion

Backing up and restoring a WordPress website should be the priority for every WordPress user. So manual, plugin-based, or hosting-provided methods, have a backup plan on your site so that you save time, money, and agony in considering a disaster; it is pretty much worth the effort. But regular backups, secure storage, and periodic testing ensure that things will work when needed.