Introduction

Restic is a fast and secure backup program. In the following sections, we will present typical workflows, starting with installing, preparing a new repository, and making the first backup.

Quickstart Guide

To get started with a local repository, first define some environment variables:

export RESTIC_REPOSITORY=/srv/restic-repo
export RESTIC_PASSWORD=some-strong-password

Initialize the repository (first time only):

restic init

Create your first backup:

restic backup ~/work

You can list all the snapshots you created with:

restic snapshots

You can restore a backup by noting the snapshot ID you want and running:

restic restore --target /tmp/restore-work your-snapshot-ID

It is a good idea to periodically check your repository’s metadata:

restic check
# or full data:
restic check --read-data

For more details continue reading the next sections.