I’ll offer you a closer look at 5 favorite top backup providers, and share how they work and how much they’ll cost you. There are numerous cloud backup providers around, but only a few that I would trust to store a backup of my valuable personal and business data. If you experience a hard drive crash, or if a file is lost or becomes corrupted for another reason, you can use the same app to restore the files over the internet from the backup provider’s server directly to your computer or device.

The process quietly runs in the background and requires no interaction from the user after the initial setup of the backup app has been completed. When the app sees a change, it either immediately sends the changes to the backup provider’s servers, or waits until a specified time of day and sends all of the modified data at once. When making use of a cloud backup solution, you install a client application on your computer or mobile device, which keeps an eye on files that you change or add to a selected set of directories. How Cloud Backup WorksĬloud backup services allow users to back up their computer or mobile device to a remote location, sending the data over the internet to the cloud backup provider’s servers. When it comes to backing up your important files, users should always follow the “3-2-1 Rule of Backups.” This rule says users should keep 3 copies of any important file on 2 different types of storage media, with 1 copy in an off-site location.īelieve me, you cannot get more “off-site” than a cloud backup provider.

Plus, while it’s a fine idea to have a local backup of your data on a USB thumb stick or an external hard disk drive, you should also have an offsite backup.

When it comes to hard drives, it’s not IF they’ll crash, it’s WHEN they’ll crash. If there is one strong and fast rule to be followed in computing, it’s back up, back up, back up!

Best personal backup option