If your WordPress site is compromised or your server fails, having access to a recent WordPress backups can make your life considerably easier. The fastest way to recover from a hacked website is to restore the latest version of the site that existed prior to the hack. You will still need to close the security hole the attacker used to compromise your site after your site is back up and running, but at least you’ll have your site back to working order in hours or even minutes.
How often should you back up your site?
The frequency with which you should back up your WordPress site should be determined primarily by how often your content changes. Sites that change infrequently may be able to get by with weekly WordPress backups. Sites with constant updates, like new users, blog posts and comments may need to be backed up hourly. Many websites will be somewhere in between.
How should I manage my WordPress backups?
The easiest way to manage your WordPress backups is via a plugin that meets your needs. There are a wide variety of options available, and depending on the cost and settings, some can perform regular automated backups. Backup location is also vital to consider – most solutions allow you to store your back-up in various locations, but it is crucial that this is carefully considered. Backing up up to a folder where your website is can be futile if your server crashes, and backing up to your laptop is pointless if your hard-drive fails. Its critical that backups are stored in a location separate physically and geographically from your website.
So how is your WordPress website backed up, and who does this?
All websites hosted by IJL Web Solutions benefit from four-times daily offsite backups as standard, so your website is automatically backed up, four times a day, and this is stored separately from your website, completely free of charge.
We also offer our hosting customers an optional WordPress plugins/security service, starting at £345 a year, whereby we keeping WordPress core and plugins up to date, and before any update we also perform an additional backup to a further remote location, for added security and resilience. For full details of this service, please contact us.
For more information about WordPress backups and why they’re so important – check out this blog post from the fantastic team at Wordfence