Instance Backup Policies

Overview

Instance Backup Policies automate the backup process for your virtual machine instances. Instead of managing backups manually or relying on per-instance schedules, policies let you define backup parameters once and apply them to multiple instances.

Key capabilities:

• Flexible scheduling -- Daily or weekly full backups at a specific time, with timezone-aware scheduling
• Incremental backup chains -- Reduce storage usage by backing up only changes between full backups
• Configurable retention -- Control how many full backup chains to keep
• Multi-instance -- Attach multiple instances to a single policy
• Disk selection -- Back up only the primary disk or all disks attached to the instance
• Real-time updates -- Policy and backup status updates appear instantly via WebSocket

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Creating a Backup Policy

User Panel

1. Navigate to Backup Policies in the sidebar (under Compute)
2. Click Add Policy
3. Configure the policy:

General:

Field	Description
Name	A descriptive name for the policy (e.g., "Daily Production Backups")

Schedule:

Field	Values	Description
Full Backup Frequency	Daily, Weekly	How often a full backup runs
Full Backup Time	Hourly selection (12-hour AM/PM format)	Time of day to start backups, displayed in your timezone
Day of Week	Sunday -- Saturday	Which day to run weekly backups (only shown for weekly frequency)

info

Times are displayed in your account's timezone. The system automatically converts to UTC for scheduling, so backups run at the time you expect regardless of server timezone.

Retention & Incremental:

Field	Default	Description
Max Incremental Chain	6	Number of incremental backups between full backups. Set to 0 for full-only backups.
Retention Count	3	Number of full backup chains to retain. Older chains are automatically deleted.
Backup Device	Primary Disk	Which disks to include: Primary Disk (boot disk only) or All Disks

4. Click Create Policy

Admin Panel

1. Navigate to Instances > Backup Policies
2. Click Add Policy
3. Select a User who will own the policy
4. Fill in the same configuration as the user panel
5. Click Create

Admins can view and manage all backup policies across all users.

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Policy List

The Backup Policies page shows all your policies as cards. Each card displays:

• Policy name (clickable to open detail page)
• Status badge -- Active (green), Paused (yellow), or Error (red)
• Schedule summary -- e.g., "Daily at 2:00 AM" or "Weekly on Monday at 3:00 AM"
• Instance count -- Number of instances attached to the policy
• Retention count -- Number of backup chains retained
• Incremental chain length -- Number of incremental backups per chain (if configured)
• Backup device -- Primary or All Disks
• Last error -- Displayed if the most recent backup failed

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Policy Detail Page

Click Manage on any policy card to open the detail page. The detail page provides:

Policy Settings

View and edit the policy configuration. Click Edit Policy to modify the schedule, retention, incremental chain, or backup device settings.

Attached Instances

A table listing all instances assigned to this policy:

Column	Description
Instance	Instance name (clickable link to instance manage page)
Status	Instance status (deployed, suspended, etc.)
Actions	Detach button to remove the instance from the policy

Use the Attach Instance dropdown and button to add instances to the policy. Only instances not already attached to another backup policy are available.

Backups

A table showing all backups created by this policy:

Column	Description
Instance	Which instance the backup belongs to
Type	Full or Incremental
Size	Backup size in human-readable format
Status	Completed, In Progress, Failed, or Pending
Created	When the backup was taken

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How Backup Scheduling Works

Daily Policies

A full backup is scheduled every day at the configured time. If the incremental chain is set (e.g., 6), the system alternates between incremental and full backups:

1. Full backup (day 1)
2. Incremental backup (days 2--7, up to the chain length)
3. Full backup (day 8, starting a new chain)

Weekly Policies

A full backup is scheduled on the configured day and time each week. Incremental backups run on the other days at the same time.

Full-Only Mode

Set Max Incremental Chain to 0 to disable incremental backups. Every scheduled backup will be a full backup.

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Retention

The Retention Count controls how many full backup chains are kept:

• A chain consists of one full backup plus its associated incremental backups
• When a new chain is created and the number of chains exceeds the retention count, the oldest chain (full backup and all its incrementals) is automatically deleted
• Setting retention to 3 means the three most recent full backup chains are preserved

warning

Deleted backups cannot be recovered. Set retention appropriately for your recovery requirements.

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Backup Storage Costs

If the administrator has configured a backup storage cost for the location, backup costs are displayed on the instance's Backups tab:

• Monthly Cost -- Per-backup cost based on backup size (GB) multiplied by the location's backup credit value
• Hourly Cost -- The monthly cost divided by hours per month

These costs appear as additional columns in the backups table when backup pricing is configured.

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Attaching Instances

Constraints

• An instance can be attached to only one backup policy at a time
• Only instances in a deployed state can have backups taken
• Detaching an instance does not delete its existing backups

From the Policy Detail Page

1. Open the policy detail page
2. In the Attached Instances section, select an instance from the dropdown
3. Click Attach

Detaching an Instance

Click the Detach button next to the instance. The instance is removed from the policy immediately. Existing backups remain until they are cleaned up by retention rules or manually deleted.

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Admin vs. User Capabilities

Capability	Admin	User
Create backup policies	Yes (for any user)	Yes (own only)
Edit/delete policies	Yes (any user's)	Yes (own only)
Attach/detach instances	Yes (any instance)	Yes (own instances only)
View all policies	Yes (across all users)	Own policies only
View backups	Yes	Yes (own only)
Delete individual backups	Yes	Yes (own only)

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Troubleshooting

Policy status shows "Error"

A backup failure has occurred. Check the error message displayed on the policy card. Common causes:

1. The instance is suspended or stopped
2. The hypervisor's backup storage is full or unreachable
3. The instance's disk is locked by another operation

Backups not running at expected time

1. Verify the policy status is Active (not Paused or Error)
2. Check that your timezone setting is correct in your profile -- times are displayed in your local timezone
3. Backup scheduling runs every few minutes; there may be a short delay after the scheduled time

"Instance is already attached to another backup policy"

Each instance can belong to only one backup policy. Detach the instance from its current policy first, then attach it to the new one.

Backup size is larger than expected

• If All Disks is selected, the backup includes all attached storage volumes, not just the boot disk
• Incremental backups are typically much smaller than full backups -- if all backups are large, check that the incremental chain is configured (not set to 0)