Schedule Backups in Acronis

The schedule employs the time settings (including the time zone) of the operating system where the agent is installed.

For example, if a protection plan is scheduled to run at 21:00 and applied to several machines located in different time zones, the backup will start on each machine at 21:00 local time.

Backup schemes

You can choose one of the predefined backup schemes or create a custom scheme. A backup scheme is a part of the protection plan that includes the backup schedule and the backup methods.

In Backup scheme, select one of the following:

• Always incremental (single-file)
  By default, backups are performed on a daily basis, Monday to Friday. You can select the time to run the backup.
  If you want to change the backup frequency, move the slider, and then specify the backup schedule.
  The backups use the single-file backup format.
  The first backup is full, which means that it is the most time-consuming. All subsequent backups are incremental and take significantly less time.
  This scheme is highly recommended if the backup location is cloud storage. Other backup schemes may include multiple full backups that consume much time and network traffic.
• Always full
  By default, backups are performed on a daily basis, Monday to Friday. You can select the time to run the backup.
  If you want to change the backup frequency, move the slider, and then specify the backup schedule.
  All backups are full.
• Weekly full, Daily incremental
  By default, backups are performed on a daily basis, Monday to Friday. You can modify the days of the week and the time to run the backup.
  A full backup is created once a week. All other backups are incremental. The day on which the full backup is created depends on the Weekly backup option (click the gear icon, then Backup options > Weekly backup).
• Monthly full, Weekly differential, Daily incremental (GFS)
  By default, incremental backups are performed on a daily basis, Monday to Friday; differential backups are performed every Saturday; full backups are performed on the first day of each month. You can modify these schedules and the time to run the backup.
  This backup scheme is displayed as a Custom scheme on the protection plan panel.
• Custom
  Specify schedules for full, differential, and incremental backups.
  Differential backup is not available when backing up SQL data, Exchange data, or system state.

With any backup scheme, you can schedule the backup to run by events, instead of by time. To do this, select the event type in the schedule selector.