How often should you back up your WordPress site?

Ideally, you should back up your site every day using online backup tools and every month locally (on your computer).

To make online backups easier, you can schedule automatic backups. For local backups, you have to do it manually.

Why this difference in frequency?

Backing up your site every day gives you several versions of your site to go back to in the event of a hack, major technical problems or any other wish to undo an update.

You only have to set these backups up once and they run on their own, a considerable time saver and real peace of mind.

Good to know: an e-commerce site’s database is modified every day with changes to your site, transactions, and so on. A daily backup is mandatory in this case.

Locally, you have to do it manually and it takes a little longer. The procedure is quick and its duration will depend on your internet connection (and the size of your site), which affects the time needed to transfer the files from your server to your computer

If you want to dig deeper into the subject, the official WordPress guide to backups (in English) remains the reference.

Why have a local backup in addition to an online one?

It can happen that your backups are inaccessible through the remote service you subscribed to.

It has already happened to me and I can assure you it can be quite annoying when a problem arises.

The backup on your computer is therefore a safeguard. It is made less often because it is a fallback version so you don’t lose everything, and because the procedure is time-consuming.