---
title: "Sites: backups and restores"
description: "The **Backups** panel at the bottom of a site's dashboard lists the snapshots your provider's control panel holds for the site and, on Enhance hosting, lets you restore from one — all of it, or just the databases or mailboxes…"
url: "https://rackhelm.com/documentation/sites-backups-and-restores/"
updated: "2026-09-24"
category: "Client Portal: Managing Your Services"
---

# Sites: backups and restores

The **Backups** panel at the bottom of a site's dashboard lists the snapshots your provider's control panel holds for the site and, on Enhance hosting, lets you restore from one — all of it, or just the databases or mailboxes you name. Open **My Sites → your site** and scroll to the Backups card. This article covers what the card shows, what a restore actually does, and which parts of it your panel supports.

## Which panels show the card

| Panel | Backups card | Restore from the portal |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **Enhance** | Yes, with a full size breakdown per snapshot. | Yes. |
| **cPanel** | Yes, listing the account backups WHM holds. Total size only. | No — your provider does it. |
| **Plesk** | No card at all. | No — your provider does it. |

> **Note:** On Plesk hosting the Backups card is deliberately not shown, because Plesk keeps its backups per storage area rather than per subscription and cannot be asked for just yours. The **Environment** card at the top of the dashboard says so: "Backups is managed in Plesk directly." Your backups still exist — they are taken and restored by your provider.

## Reading the backup list

![The Backups panel with date tabs and a list of snapshots with size breakdowns](/wp-content/uploads/rackhelm-docs/portal-services-site-backups.png)
Backups are grouped into a tab per day; the newest day opens first.

The panel loads after the rest of the dashboard, so a spinner on first paint is normal. Up to 30 recent snapshots are fetched and grouped into a tab per day, labelled **Today**, **Yesterday** or the date, with a count badge.

Each row shows the time the backup started and a badge marking it **Manual** or **Auto**, then a breakdown in megabytes:

| Figure | Meaning |
| --- | --- |
| **Total** | The whole snapshot. |
| **Files** | The website files portion. |
| **DBs** | How many databases are in the snapshot, and their combined size. |
| **Accounts** | How many mailboxes are in the snapshot, and their combined size. |

> **Note:** Only Enhance reports that breakdown. cPanel's backup listing carries a single size per snapshot, so a cPanel row shows **Total** alone. Nothing is missing from the backup itself; the panel simply does not publish the detail.

> **Note:** The list is cached for two hours to keep the dashboard fast. Use **Refresh** on the card header to pull a fresh list from the panel.

Backups themselves are taken on the schedule your provider sets. There is no button in this release to start one on demand — ask your provider if you need an extra snapshot before a risky change.

## Restoring

![The Restore Backup dialog with switches for files, databases and emails](/wp-content/uploads/rackhelm-docs/portal-services-site-restore-modal.png)
Files, databases and mailboxes are chosen independently.

1. Select **Restore** on the snapshot you want. The dialog names the date and time you picked and lists what that snapshot contains.
2. Choose what to bring back:
   - **Restore All Website Files** — a single switch, on by default. Files are all or nothing.
   - **Databases** — **Restore All Databases** (the default), **Restore Specific Databases**, or **Do Not Restore Databases**.
   - **Emails** — **Restore All Emails**, **Restore Specific Emails**, or **Do Not Restore Emails** (the default).
3. Choosing **Restore Specific …** reveals a tick list read from the snapshot itself, so you only ever see what is actually in it.
4. Select **Confirm Restore**.

The panel accepts the job and you are returned to the dashboard with "Backup restore requested successfully." The restore then runs in the background — how long it takes depends on the size of the snapshot.

> **Warning:** A restore overwrites current data, as the dialog states. Anything changed since the snapshot was taken — new orders in a shop database, new uploads, new mail — is lost for whatever you restore. Restore only the parts you need: if a database change broke the site, restore the database and leave files and mail alone.

> **Note:** The tick list under **Restore Specific Databases** lists MySQL databases only. If your site also uses PostgreSQL, those databases are rolled back *only* when you choose **Restore All Databases**; picking specific databases, or **Do Not Restore Databases**, leaves PostgreSQL untouched.

## Choosing what to restore

| Situation | Suggested selection |
| --- | --- |
| A plugin or theme update broke the site. | Files only — switch on **Restore All Website Files**, set databases and emails to **Do Not Restore**. |
| Content was deleted from the CMS. | Databases only — turn the files switch off and pick the database that holds the content. |
| A mailbox was emptied by mistake. | Emails only — **Restore Specific Emails** and tick just that address. |
| The site was compromised. | Everything, from a snapshot dated before the compromise. Then change every FTP, database and mailbox password. |

## Troubleshooting

| Symptom | Cause / fix |
| --- | --- |
| "Please select at least one item to restore." | Every option was left off. Choose at least files, one database, or one mailbox. |
| "Restore failed: …" with some other message. | The message after the colon is the panel's own refusal — a snapshot that has expired, or a restore already running on the site. Wait and try again, or open a ticket quoting it. |
| "That backup could not be identified. Please reload the page and try again." | The snapshot the dialog was holding is no longer one the panel recognises, usually because the list on screen is stale. Use **Refresh** and pick the snapshot again. |
| "Failed to load backups." in the card. | The request to the control panel failed. Use **Refresh**; if it persists, open a ticket. |
| "Backups cannot be managed right now. The site is pending provisioning or missing its external ID." | The site has not finished being created on the panel yet. |
| "No backups found." | The panel is holding no snapshots for this site — normal for a site created in the last day or so. On cPanel it also means backups have not been switched on in WHM, which is a true "none" and not an error. If the site is older, ask your provider whether backups are enabled on the plan. |
| The specific-database and specific-email tick lists are always empty on cPanel. | Expected: cPanel's backup listing carries no per-snapshot manifest, so there is nothing to enumerate. It makes no difference in practice, because cPanel restores are done by your provider. |
| "Loading databases from snapshot…" never finishes, or the tick lists show "Failed to load snapshot data." | The snapshot's contents could not be read. Use **Restore All** for that category, or try again shortly. |
| There is no Backups card on the dashboard at all. | You are on Plesk hosting, where backups are handled in Plesk by your provider. The Environment card says so. |
| The restore was accepted but nothing changed. | Restores run in the background and large snapshots take time. Wait, then reload the site. If it still looks wrong after an hour, open a ticket quoting the snapshot's date and time. |