Database Backups

Database backups for WordPress environments can be viewed and downloaded in the application view of the VIP Dashboard. Database backups are useful for internal security policies, to automate regular data ingestion for analysis systems, and can be imported to local development environments.

By default:

• Databases for production environments are backed up every hour, including custom tables, and non-production databases are backed up daily.
• The hourly backups of a production environment are available for download within the most recent three days (72 hours). Beyond that time frame, daily backups are available for download.
• Backups are encrypted at rest before being replicated to Amazon AWS S3 utilizing encryption in transit and retained for 30 days.
• Backup SQL database download files are in a gzip-compressed plain text format with the file extension *.sql.gz.
• For WordPress multisite, only backup copies of the main network site (ID 1) will include the multisite global tables of the database (e.g., wp_blogs, wp_users).
• Database backup copies for specific tables will include data for the requested tables, and commented out lines for all other tables that exist in the database.

Limitations

• Only one database backup file per environment can be prepared for download at a time.
• An “Active Backup Copy” is only available for download for 24 hours or until a new Database Backup copy is requested.
• When configuring a database backup copy for specific tables:
  • Characters in requested table names are limited to letters (A-Z, a-z), numbers (0-9), hyphens (-), and underscores (_).
  • Requests for non-existent tables will not trigger an error. If only one table is requested, and it does not exist, an empty database backup file will be generated.

Access

1. Navigate to the VIP Dashboard for an application.
2. Select an environment from the environment dropdown located at the upper left of the VIP Dashboard.
3. Select the “Data” panel option at the left.
4. Select “Database Backups”.

The “Next hourly backup is in [0-9]m” countdown is displayed in the top right of the panel and indicates when the next automated backup will occur.

Download a full database backup

Download a backup copy of the entire database of a WordPress single site or a WordPress multisite environment.

1. Select the date of the backup for download. Database backups are grouped by date, and dates can be selected from buttons in a carousel labeled “Select a date“. The buttons also display the number of backups available for download for each date.
2. Select the “Configure Download” button to the right of a database backup.
3. In the “Configure your backup copy” modal, select “Entire database“.
4. Select the “Generate Backup Copy” button to the right of a database backup.
   The button label will display the text “Preparing Backup” while the database backup file is being prepared for download.
   Backup files for larger databases will take a longer time to prepare.
5. The button label will display the text “Download” when the database backup file is ready for download. Select “Download” to download the file to the user’s local machine.

Download a partial database backup

Download one or more specific tables from a database backup copy of a WordPress single site or a WordPress multisite environment.

1. Select the date of the backup for download. Database backups are grouped by date, and dates can be selected from buttons in a carousel labeled “Select a date“. The buttons also display the number of backups available for download for each date.
2. Select the “Configure Download” button to the right of a database backup.
3. In the “Configure your backup copy” modal, select “Specific tables“.
4. In the text field below “Enter required table names”, list the database tables to include in the partial database backup copy. Add one table name per line in the text field.
5. Select the “Generate Backup Copy” button to the right of a database backup.
   The button label will display the text “Preparing Backup” while the database backup file is being prepared for download.
   Backup files for larger databases will take a longer time to prepare.
6. The button label will display the text “Download” when the database backup file is ready for download. Select “Download” to download the file to the user’s local machine.

Download a database backup for a network site

Download a database tables from a backup copy for an individual network site on a WordPress multisite environment.

1. Select the date of the backup for download. Database backups are grouped by date, and dates can be selected from buttons in a carousel labeled “Select a date“. The buttons also display the number of backups available for download for each date.
2. Select the “Configure Download” button to the right of a database backup.
3. In the “Configure your backup copy” modal, select “A single network site“.
4. Select the search field below “Select a network site” to display the first ten network sites from the multisite.
5. Select a site from the dropdown list. A site can also be found by typing the site’s network site ID or home_url into the search field as a search term.
6. Select the “Generate Backup Copy” button to the right of a database backup.
   The button label will display the text “Preparing Backup” while the database backup file is being prepared for download.
   Backup files for larger databases will take a longer time to prepare.
7. The button label will display the text “Download” when the database backup file is ready for download. Select “Download” to download the file to the user’s local machine.

Copy a link to a prepared database backup

Database Backup copies that are available for download are displayed near the top of the Database Backups panel below the label “Active Backup Copy“.

A shareable link to the prepared backup file can be copied by selecting the “Copy Link” button. The link has a 15 minute expiration.

Configure Database Backup Shipping

The Database Backup Shipping feature automatically ships database backups for an application’s production environment at regular intervals to an assigned AWS S3 bucket. To enable Database Backup Shipping, select the “Configure” button displayed in the right-hand column of the Backups panel.