You have put countless hours and effort into your website. It would be crushing to lose all of that hard work. As hard as it may be to believe, you could lose every post, every comment, and every image on your WordPress site if the database is erased or corrupted. Fortunately, you can get it all back if you have a WordPress backup. You can restore your files quickly if you backed up your database properly.

Backing Up Your WP Site

Your WordPress site consists of the following items. All of these are used in various combinations to create your website and are separate from your database. This is why it is important to back up both these files and your site’s database.

WordPress Core installation
Plugins
WordPress themes
Images and files
JavaScript, PHP, and other code files
Additional files and static web pages

How Often to Backup Your Site

You should always back up your site before you make any updates. Sometimes updates to plugins or themes can cause issues on a site, and a back up makes it quick and easy to restore what was lost. If you post or blog frequently you should back up more often. The decision is ultimately up to you. You will have to decide how much you are willing to risk losing if the site is not backed up.

Ways to Do a WordPress Backup

There are several ways to back up your WordPress Site:

Website host backup software: check with your host to see what services your plan may include. Be wary of having your back up files and original files on the same server.
Copy files to your desktop: use a program like FTP Clients to back up your files on your computer. You can compress them into a zip file to save space.
Sync your site: programs like WinSCP make it easy to ensure that the copy of your content on your server matches the backup on your hard drive.
Automatic backups: Choose from a wide variety of plugins to automatically back up your WordPress database.

It is a good idea to keep three backups on file. This way if you lose one or there are corruption errors you have options. If your host provides backups, keep another copy on your hard drive and the third one on an external drive. WordPress backup is something every website owner should consider. Don’t want to worry about backing up your site? Let us take that worry off your shoulders.