Backups

Neon does not yet provide support for configuring automated backups in the Neon Console or API. This feature is on our roadmap. You can expect it to be introduced in the coming months. In the meantime, we support the following backup options:

Built-in backups with Neon's point-in-time restore feature

Neon retains a history for all branches, allowing you to restore your data to a particular date and time or Log Sequence Number (LSN). The history retention period is configurable. The supported limits are 24 hours for Neon Free Tier users, 7 days for Launch plan users, and 30 days for Scale plan users. With this backup option, no action or automation is required. You can restore your data to a past state at any time by creating a database branch, which is a near-instant operation. This feature is referred to as Point-in-time restore.

For information about creating a point-in-time restore branch, see Branching — Point-in-time restore.

pg_dump

You can backup a database using pg_dump, in the same way backups are created for a standalone Postgres instance.

This method dumps a single database in a single branch of your Neon project. If you need to create backups for multiple databases in multiple branches, you must perform a dump operation for each database in each branch separately.

To dump a database from your Neon project, please refer to the pg_dump instructions in our Import from Postgres guide.

Backups with @neondatabase/pg-import

Export your data from the source database with @neondatabase/pg-import:

npx @neondatabase/pg-import --source <source_database_connection_string> --backup-file-path <dump_file_name>

The @neondatabase/pg-import command above includes these arguments:

• --source: Specifies the source database name or connection string.
• --backup-file-path: The dump file name. It can be any name you choose (./mydumpfile.bak, for example).

For more command options, see all @neondatabase/pg-import options.

Automate Postgres Backups with a GitHub Action

This blog post from a Neon community member describes how to set up a nightly backup to an AWS S3 storage bucket using a GitHub Action: Nightly Postgres Backups via GitHub Actions.