Many businesses keep everything on one computer or on a disk nobody checks. If that machine fails or gets stolen, years of invoices and contracts go with it. restic copies your folders to another disk or to the cloud, encrypted with your password. After the first backup, each new one only uploads what changed.
Who this is NOT for
If nobody on your team is comfortable typing commands in a terminal, this is not for you. Everything the README and its site show is done with commands, and there are no windows or buttons. Also skip it if you have nowhere safe to keep the password: the README itself warns that if you lose it, your data is «irrecoverably lost». And if your whole business already lives in Google Drive or Dropbox, you do not need it yet. Come back when you have important files on a computer or server of your own.
What I like most is that it does not let you forget what matters. Its own README says keeping the backup on the same machine is not a real strategy. It also puts restoring above backing up: «Much more important than backup is restore». The mistake almost everyone makes is setting up the backup and never testing that it can be recovered. Try restic restore on day one. Watch out for two things. It is still on 0.x versions: the latest is 0.19.1, from July 2026. Its site makes clear that before 1.0 there may be breaking changes. The project is alive, with the last commit on October 11, 2026. And the README says nothing about scheduling automatic backups: if nobody runs it, nothing gets backed up.
Your first step
After installing it with the official guide, create a test repository with restic init --repo /tmp/backup. Back up a small folder with restic --repo /tmp/backup backup <your-folder>, then recover it with restic restore to check that it works.
The restic implementation guide
The project belongs to The restic backup program (restic) and it is free: the link beside asks for nothing. The guide to set it up without getting lost is ours: step by step, common mistakes and a checklist. Leave your email and we will send it.
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