DigitalOcean Backups & Snapshots Overview¶

Introduction¶

Protect your data with automated backups and manual snapshots for Droplets, Volumes, and Databases.

Backups vs Snapshots¶

Feature	Backups	Snapshots
Frequency	Weekly (auto)	Manual
Retention	4 backups	Unlimited
Cost	20% of resource	$0.05/GB/month
Use Case	Ongoing protection	Templates, migrations

Droplet Backups¶

# Enable backups
doctl compute droplet-action enable-backups <droplet-id>

# Cost: 20% of Droplet price
# Frequency: Weekly
# Retention: 4 most recent backups

Droplet Snapshots¶

# Create snapshot
doctl compute droplet-action snapshot <droplet-id> \
  --snapshot-name "backup-2026-01-10"

# Cost: $0.05/GB/month
# Use for: Templates, disaster recovery

Volume Snapshots¶

# Create volume snapshot
doctl compute volume-snapshot create \
  --volume-id <volume-id> \
  --snapshot-name "db-backup-2026-01-10"

Database Backups¶

Automated:
├─> Daily backups
├─> 7-day retention
├─> Point-in-time recovery
└─> Free (included)

Best Practices¶

Enable backups for production Droplets
Create snapshots before major changes
Test restore procedures regularly
Use snapshots for templates
Clean up old snapshots