# Backups and git

> Four ways to get your notes out — copying the folder, zip export, encrypted archives, and an automatic git mirror.

Source: https://papyra.app/docs/backups/

Your notes are already plain files, so backup is a question of convenience
rather than possibility. Papyra offers several routes; pick whichever you will
actually keep doing.

## Copy the folder

The whole of `/data` is the backup. `rsync` it, snapshot the volume, point your
existing backup tool at it — nothing here needs Papyra's cooperation.

```bash
rsync -a --delete /var/lib/docker/volumes/papyra-data/_data/ /backup/papyra/
```

Restoring is putting the folder back. The SQLite cache and Lucene index inside
`.papyra/` are rebuildable, so a backup that skips them is still complete — but
**do keep `/data/.papyra/keys/`**, or every signed-in browser is logged out on
restore.

## Zip export

**Settings → Backup → Export**. Downloads your whole vault as a zip. Per account,
on demand, no scheduling. Good for taking a copy before you change something.

## Encrypted archives

**Settings → Backup → Generate**. Produces an AES-GCM encrypted archive with a
key derived from a password you choose. **Settings → Backup → Restore** takes one
back.

Use this when the backup will sit somewhere you do not fully trust — object
storage, a USB stick, a friend's NAS.

> The password is not recoverable. Papyra does not store it and cannot reset it.
> An encrypted backup with a forgotten password is lost.

## Automatic git mirror

**Settings → Backup → Git**, per account. Give it a remote and a branch and
Papyra commits and pushes your notes on a schedule, using a real git
implementation rather than shelling out.

This is the one to set up if you want the backup to happen without you
remembering. It also gives you a full history of every note, browsable with any
git tool.

**It will never force-push over a diverged remote.** If the remote's history has
moved apart from Papyra's — you pushed from elsewhere, or rewrote history — the
sync stops and reports it rather than overwriting whatever is there. Resolve it
by hand and it resumes.

Push manually any time with **Sync now**.

## What to actually do

For most people: keep the volume in whatever backs up the rest of the machine,
and turn on the git mirror. The first protects you from losing the disk; the
second from losing a note you wanted back.

Add encrypted archives when the copy leaves your control.

## Restoring onto a fresh instance

1. Bring up Papyra with an empty volume so it initialises.
2. Stop the container.
3. Put the backed-up `/data` in place, including `.papyra/keys/`.
4. Start it again.

On start-up Papyra reconciles disk against cache **before** it opens the port, so
notes restored underneath it are picked up on the way up. You do not need to
rebuild anything by hand, though **Settings → Data & Storage** will rebuild the
search index if search looks stale afterwards.

## Trash is not a backup

Deleted notes sit in Trash for the retention period — 30 days by default,
configurable in **Settings → Data & Storage**, including "keep forever" and
"delete immediately". Once retention expires the note is erased for good.

Snapshots of overwritten text are a different mechanism again, kept per note and
reachable from **File recovery** and **Time machine** in the note toolbar.
Neither of those is a substitute for having the folder somewhere else.