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How to Back Up and Restore Your OpenClaw VPS

This guide explains how to create backups of your OpenClaw agent and restore them when needed. Regular backups ensure your data remains safe and recoverable.


Why Regular Backups Are Important


Creating regular backups of your OpenClaw VPS is essential for protecting your AI agent and its data.


  • Prevent Data Loss: Protect against accidental deletion, configuration errors, or corrupted files.
  • Easy Recovery: Quickly restore your agent to a working state after issues or failed updates.
  • Migration Ready: Easily move your agent to a new VPS or environment with all settings intact.


Best Practice: Run a backup before making any major changes such as updating OpenClaw, adding new providers, or modifying configurations.


Prerequisites


Before backing up or restoring, ensure you have:


  • An active OpenClaw VPS
  • SSH access to your VPS (see the Essential Command Guide)
  • Sufficient disk space - check available space with df -h to ensure backups can be saved.


How to Back Up Your OpenClaw Data


The backup process is simple and automated with a single command.


  1. Run setup command: openclaw-backup.


  1. The system will process the backup and display detailed information:


Note: The backup filename includes a timestamp (YYYYMMDD-HHMMSS), making it easy to identify when each backup was created.


Where to Find Your Backups


All backups are stored in the /root/backups/ directory.


  1. Run command to list all available backup


ls /root/backups




How to Restore a Backup


If you need to revert to a previous state, follow these steps to restore a backup.


  1. Navigate to the OpenClaw directory and extract the backup file. 


cd /opt/openclaw && tar -xzf /root/backups/<backup-file-name>



Replace <backup-file-name> with the actual filename. Example: cd /opt/openclaw && tar -xzf /root/backups/openclaw-backup-20260304-004233.tar.gz


  1. After extracting the backup, restart the OpenClaw services to apply the restored configuration.


docker compose up -d --force-recreate


  1. Check that OpenClaw is running correctly by running command openclaw-status.



Need Further Assistance?


If you face any issues or need assistance, don’t hesitate to reach out — our support team is always ready to help!


🔧 Need help? Submit a Support Ticket

💬 Chat with us on Live Chat via our website



Updated on: 04/03/2026

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