Supabase backup guides
Everything we know about backing up and restoring Supabase projects, written down. These are longer reads than the docs: how the options compare, what they cost, and where they quietly fall short.
Back up
Backup options
Every way to back up a Supabase project — built-in Pro backups, the $100/month PITR add-on, DIY pg_dump with working commands — and the two gaps they all share.
Storage backup
Supabase backups and PITR never include Storage files. Two free ways to copy every bucket out — rclone and the open-source CLI — and how to put files back.
GitHub Actions backup
The Free plan has no automated backups. A complete scheduled workflow: secrets, the 5 GB/month egress reality, and why weekly is the free-tier frequency.
Manual backup
Three ways to take a manual Supabase backup right now — the dashboard (and when its button is missing), supabase db dump, and pg_dump — plus how to download the file and check it restores.
.sql export
Most projects cannot download Supabase's own backups. The pg_dump command that produces a restorable .sql file, the supabase db dump no-data trap, and how to automate it.
Export a database
Four different things people mean by export, and the exact command for each — supabase db dump, pg_dump against the pooler, cloning a whole project — plus the one thing no export covers.
Free plan backups
No — the Free plan does not include automated backups. What Free actually gives you, the one-week pause clock, and three ways to back up a free project (two of them free).
Lovable backups
Lovable Cloud gives you export paths but not the Supabase project; a connected Supabase project is yours to back up properly. Which mode you are in, and what each one allows.
Restore & recover
Restore & roll back
Organized by bad day: the dashboard restore, PITR, your own dump into a fresh project with the flags that matter — and rolling back a single table instead of the whole database.
Restore testing
A backup you have never restored is a hope, not a backup. The manual restore drill with working commands, and two ways to automate it.
Disaster recovery
Six failure scenarios mapped to the backup that saves you and the path back — RPO and RTO in Supabase terms, a triage runbook, and a 15-point checklist.
PITR explained
What point-in-time recovery is, how WAL archiving makes it work, what it really costs once compute is counted, what it never covers, and how to turn it off.
Paused projects
Free projects pause after a week of low activity. How to resume one, why the 90-day deadline you read about is now 1 year, and how to get the data out if that window closed.
Where to store
Backup to Cloudflare R2
Zero egress fees change the restore math. Bucket, scoped credentials, the endpoint and path-style details, CLI config, and a weekly GitHub Actions schedule.
Backup to AWS S3
The standard choice, set up properly: bucket and least-privilege IAM with the exact policy, CLI config with region instead of endpoint, and lifecycle rules that keep old snapshots cheap.
Backup to Backblaze B2
The cheapest storage of the three destinations, with egress free up to 3x what you store. Application key setup, the keyID → Access Key ID mapping, CLI config, and lifecycle housekeeping.
Backup to Google Drive
Drive is not S3-compatible, and most backup tools — ours included — cannot write to it. Two honest paths: a DIY pg_dump + rclone workflow, or supabackup — and why teams end up on object storage anyway.
GDPR & residency
Which Supabase regions are in the EU, where the DPA and sub-processor list live, and what every backup copy — Supabase's, a vendor's, ours — does to your residency analysis.
PostgreSQL
The same tools without the Supabase specifics: pg_dump, pg_restore, and how to check a restore on any Postgres host — RDS, Neon, Railway, or your own server.
PostgreSQL backup
pg_dump, pg_basebackup, or WAL archiving: which PostgreSQL backup you need, what each one can restore, what managed hosts like RDS, Neon, and Render already keep, and how to test restores.
pg_dump to S3
A scheduled pg_dump to S3, R2, or B2 script for any PostgreSQL database: credentials that stay out of shell history, cron or systemd or GitHub Actions, encryption, retention — and proof the dump restores.
pg_restore
The pg_restore command with every flag that matters, custom vs plain SQL dumps, the five errors everyone hits, and how to check the restore actually worked.
Postgres backup tools
pgBackRest, Barman, WAL-G, pgBackWeb, Databasus, SimpleBackups, and pg_dump with cron, compared on backup type, point-in-time recovery, managed hosts, and whether they test restores.
pg_dumpall
pg_dumpall examples and options: every database plus roles in one script, gzip, globals only, exclude databases, restoring with psql (and the error every restore prints), one database from the file, and why it fails on AWS RDS.
Compare
Backup tools
Six ways to back up a Supabase project, compared honestly on coverage, restore verification, and price — official backups and PITR, Databasus, SimpleBackups, supabackup, DIY GitHub Actions, and BackupDrill.
Supabase PITR cost & coverage
What PITR costs per project ($100/month for a 7-day window, about $130 with the compute it requires), what it covers, what it never covers, and the cheaper alternatives — BackupDrill included.
Databasus vs BackupDrill
Both restore-test their backups — rare agreement. The real choice: free self-hosted on a machine you run, or hosted with Storage files in the drill.
SimpleBackups vs BackupDrill
Breadth versus verified restorability: SimpleBackups covers more of the Supabase stack; BackupDrill restore-tests every backup. Compared honestly.
Supabackup vs BackupDrill
Supabackup sends database dumps to your Google Drive for $9/month. BackupDrill backs up the database — plus Storage files once you add their S3 keys — into your own bucket and drills the latest snapshot weekly. Compared honestly.
ReviveDB vs BackupDrill
Both restore-test backups — ReviveDB every one, BackupDrill the latest snapshot weekly. ReviveDB also covers Edge Functions and config, stored in the EU; BackupDrill writes into your own bucket.
BackProve vs BackupDrill
Both restore-test backups of the database and Storage files (BackupDrill's once you add the project's Storage S3 keys). BackProve is one $12/month plan with encryption it manages, stored in the EU; BackupDrill writes into your own bucket.