Finding a good and free backup service in shared hosting is hard. Many web hosts don’t have free backups, and when they do, they only provide one or two days of daily backups. The HostArmada backup service is the best of all the web hosting providers. The basic HostArmada plan stores daily backups for 7 days, and the Speed Reaper plan stores them for 21 days. That’s far higher than any other shared web host.
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HostArmada Backup Tiers
Here’s how many days HostArmada stores daily backups depending on the plan:
| HostArmada Plan Name | Number of Daily Backups |
|---|---|
| Start Dock | 7 days |
| Web Warp | 14 days |
| Speed Reaper | 21 days |
Even the cheapest HostArmada package stores backups for more days than any other shared hosting provider. For the latest discounts, check out the HostArmada coupon page.
These backups are stored offsite, so there’s no danger of losing them if your server crashes. In addition, they don’t use up resources on your server. This is better than using 3rd party plugins like UpdraftPlus on shared hosting, which can throttle your server because of the intense CPU usage.
Get more details in the full HostArmada review.
Restoring HostArmada Backups
Restoring backups on HostArmada is easy, and you can do it automatically from cPanel. HostArmada uses the cPanel plugin “JetBackup”, a self-serve tool for managing backups. Using this interface, you can:
- Restore previous backups
- Take snapshots of your server
- Restore individual files, folders, and databases
Many web hosts like KnownHost, make your raise a ticket to restore your files or folders, but HostArmada lets you do so on your own. It’s vital during an emergency to restore your site as soon as possible without waiting for someone else to do it for you. Apart from HostArmada, NameHero is another web host that gives you control over the restore process.
HostArmada Backups vs Other Web Host Backups
Here’s how HostArmada stacks up against the competition among the web hosting providers with free backups.
HostArmada Backups vs Hostgator Backups
The Hostgator backup service is terrible. It does not commit to saving your data in case of an emergency. According to the documentation, it takes a single non-guaranteed backup on a random day of the week, and you need to contact customer service to see if they can restore it for you. For backups you can rely on, you have to purchase the CodeGuard basic add-on, which starts at $23.95 per year and gives you a measly 1 GB of storage.
Check out the Hostgator promo code page to see all the Hostgator deals.
HostArmada Backups vs NameHero
The most significant difference between HostArmada’s backups and NameHero is that NameHero retains your daily backup for only one day while keeping a rotating weekly backup. This means that you can always revert to at least one day. And if you want to go back further, you can choose to restore the weekly backup. For more, check out my NameHero vs HostArmada detailed comparison.
The problem is that it doesn’t give you enough flexibility in choosing a restore point. Your weekly backup might be just one day old when things go wrong, and then you can’t revert to a state before that date. With HostArmada backups, you can always go back to any point in the past seven days, and that’s a lot more valuable than just being able to go back one day.
Despite this, I like the NameHero backup service, and I’ve used it myself several times. Here’s a screenshot of the NameHero backups in action:
Check out the NameHero coupon page to get the best NameHero deals.
KnownHost Backups vs HostArmada Backups
KnownHost also uses the JetBackup cPanel plugin like HostArmada and NameHero, but unlike NameHero, KnownHost saves two days of backups instead of just one, in addition to the weekly backup. So you’re not restricted to just going back one day in time.
The significant disadvantage, however, is that KnownHost requires you to contact customer support to restore a backup, unlike NameHero or HostArmada. This is very unfortunate since the whole purpose of a backup is to restore your site when things go wrong, and you don’t want to wait for someone to respond to a ticket. So HostArmada beats KnownHost in terms of backups.
Here’s the KnownHost coupon code page to get started with their best discounts.
HostArmada Backups vs SiteGround Backups
SiteGround has better backups than HostArmada, but I don’t include it on my list of best web hosts because SiteGround is now too expensive and not worth it. But their backup system is unquestionably better. They store 30-days of backups for all their shared hosting plans, and you can revert to any copy from the dashboard without raising a ticket.
While HostArmada’s backup retention policies are superior to all other web hosts, it’s still lower than SiteGround. The restoration process with JetBackup isn’t as smooth either, since you have separate sections for database and file restoration, whereas it’s an integrated system on SiteGround. Here’s the SiteGround coupon page to get the best deals.
You can also check out the complete HostArmada vs SiteGround comparison page to learn more.
HostArmada Backups: Better than CodeGuard and Jetpack Backup
HostArmada’s backup service is superior to 3rd party services like CodeGuard and Jetpack backup for one simple reason – it doesn’t depend on the number of sites you host. With CodeGuard and Jetpack Backup, you have to pay extra for each site’s storage. These costs can add up very quickly if you have just two or three websites, particularly if not all of them are as important. With HostArmada backups, it doesn’t matter how many websites you have. As long as your plan is within your storage limits, you don’t need to worry about extra fees.
HostArmada’s VPS Backups are Tailored to your Needs
While HostArmada backups don’t count towards your storage on shared hosting and are stored offsite, the backups for the VPS packages are stored on your server. As a result, the HostArmada team will customize the frequency of your VPS backups to optimize the free space on your disk drive. They’ll discuss the backup rotation in advance, and you can contact the customer service team to adjust the backup schedule if necessary.
Final Thoughts on HostArmada Backups
HostArmada has the best backups for shared hosting, apart from SiteGround, which I don’t recommend because of the high costs. Other web hosts like NameHero and KnownHost are tempting because of the LiteSpeed web server, but they both fall behind HostArmada regarding backups. If you already have a 3rd party backup system in place, this might not matter to you, but if having free and reliable restorations is a deciding factor, then HostArmada rockets to the top of your list.
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