VM Backup & Restore for unRAID

Github link - https://github.com/jcofer555/vm-backup-and-restore

A utility to backup a VM's vdisk, nvram, and xml and restore when needed

Development has ended and no further updates will be released

## Features ##

- Backing up of a single VM or multiple VMs

- Restoring of a single VM or multiple VMs

- Offers scheduling of backups

- Ability to set how many backups you want to keep

- Dry run support

- Notification support for discord, gotify, ntfy, pushover, slack, and unraids built in

- Ability to set an owner for your backups

- Logging available in the webui and at /tmp/vm-backup-and-restore

- NOTE: When running a backup or restore, selected VMs are stopped and then restarted only if they were running beforehand

Edited May 27May 27 by jcofer555

reserved

I can't seem to select a backup destination when I click select nothing happens

24 minutes ago, mayberts said:

I can't seem to select a backup destination when I click select nothing happens

can you show a screenshot of how you are attempting to do it

37 minutes ago, jcofer555 said:

can you show a screenshot of how you are attempting to do it

I have tried different locations too

23 minutes ago, mayberts said:

I have tried different locations too

you have got to select a folder by checking a checkbox and then clicking select, so is it possible there is no folders at that path?

Edited February 23Feb 23 by jcofer555

Haha, how did I miss that? so far this looks good, doing a dry run now. Thank you

8 minutes ago, mayberts said:

Haha, how did I miss that? so far this looks good, doing a dry run now. Thank you

to be fair those picker modals can be done soooo many different ways haha. hope you find it useful, reach out with any feedback/issues anytime

I tried it, but I get the following error message that I don't understand:

eBlockerOS 4's vdisk /mnt/user/isos/eBlockerVM-disk001.qcow2 is using mount type (USER) and backup destination (OTHER)

They must be on the same mount type i.e both fields using user or both user0 or none using either user or user0

1 hour ago, Zwirbel said:

I tried it, but I get the following error message that I don't understand:

eBlockerOS 4's vdisk /mnt/user/isos/eBlockerVM-disk001.qcow2 is using mount type (USER) and backup destination (OTHER)

They must be on the same mount type i.e both fields using user or both user0 or none using either user or user0

is your backup destination set to a /mnt/user based path? or is it just /mnt/cache or something else?

14 hours ago, jcofer555 said:

is your backup destination set to a /mnt/user based path? or is it just /mnt/cache or something else?

I have the same issue. I would like to run backups to another device on the network. But, it is at the following /mnt/remotes/NAS_backups.

So are you suggesting that this needs to be /mnt/user/NAS_backups ?
I guess that works, but changing it now would break all sorts of other stuff for me.

6 minutes ago, The_Holocron said:

I have the same issue. I would like to run backups to another device on the network. But, it is at the following /mnt/remotes/NAS_backups.

So are you suggesting that this needs to be /mnt/user/NAS_backups ?
I guess that works, but changing it now would break all sorts of other stuff for me.

thanks for the details. that brings a good point for me to allow that, the reason it's blocked right now is i was trying to prevent loss of data where someone writes from user to disk or disk to user based paths but didn't consider the wanting to use /mnt/remotes which is a good thing to be able to do so i'll look into that soon to open up

On a related topic, why will it not allow me to select /mnt/user/bu-cor-vms, or any folder directly under /mnt/user but it will allow me to select a folder within /mnt/user/bu-cor-vms?

Edited February 24Feb 24 by The_Holocron
clarification

Just now, The_Holocron said:

On a related topic, why will it not allow me to select /mnt/user/bu-cor-vm, but it will allow me to select a folder within /mnt/user/bu-cor-vm?

this is to prevent the backups going directly to the root of a share, mainly this is a protection for those that use exclusive shares. since unraid doesn't expose this setting to be programmed against (that i know of at least) means i can't make it be allowed for those shares not exclusive and not allowed for those share that are exclusive so i went with the safer option which was to just force to use a subfolder

Just now, jcofer555 said:

i can't make it be allowed for those shares not exclusive and not allowed for those share that are exclusive so i went with the safer option which was to just force to use a subfolder

gesundheit*

_{*okay, i think}

6 minutes ago, jcofer555 said:

thanks for the details. that brings a good point for me to allow that, the reason it's blocked right now is i was trying to prevent loss of data where someone writes from user to disk or disk to user based paths but didn't consider the wanting to use /mnt/remotes which is a good thing to be able to do so i'll look into that soon to open up

I mean, I guess one could use all sorts of other actions to copy/sync backups the remote shares, but personally I would prefer to limit the number of links in the chain. So this one change would be ideal, IMO.

Edited February 24Feb 24 by The_Holocron

5 minutes ago, The_Holocron said:

I mean, I guess one could use all sorts of other actions to copy/sync backups the remote shares, but personally I would prefer to limit the number of links in the chain.

yep for sure

1 hour ago, The_Holocron said:

I mean, I guess one could use all sorts of other actions to copy/sync backups the remote shares, but personally I would prefer to limit the number of links in the chain. So this one change would be ideal, IMO.

fix has been released as 2026.02.24.02, please update

2 hours ago, jcofer555 said:

fix has been released as 2026.02.24.02, please update

Updated, still seeing the same mount type error.

Backup session finished - 2026-02-24 22:04:24

Backup duration: 8s

...

[ERROR] Skipping PMOX BU Serv due to incompatible mount types

[ERROR] They must be on the same mount type i.e both fields using user or both user0 or none using either user or user0

[ERROR] Vdisk /mnt/user/domains/PMOX BU Serv/vdisk1.img is using mount type (USER) and backup destination (OTHER)

PMOX BU Serv is now stopped

Stopping PMOX BU Serv

Started backup for PMOX BU Serv

Backing up VM(s) - PMOX BU Serv

Backup session started - 2026-02-24 22:04:15

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A few other notes:

1. This is a jumble, particularly if you have multiple VMs selected for backup.

2. When you click EDIT here, the EDIT button at 3 appears.

3. This EDIT button, when you click EDIT at 2, seems awkward. Perhaps this should be "SAVE" or "UPDATE"?

Love where this is going.

6 minutes ago, The_Holocron said:

Updated, still seeing the same mount type error.

Backup session finished - 2026-02-24 22:04:24

Backup duration: 8s

...

[ERROR] Skipping PMOX BU Serv due to incompatible mount types

[ERROR] They must be on the same mount type i.e both fields using user or both user0 or none using either user or user0

[ERROR] Vdisk /mnt/user/domains/PMOX BU Serv/vdisk1.img is using mount type (USER) and backup destination (OTHER)

PMOX BU Serv is now stopped

Stopping PMOX BU Serv

Started backup for PMOX BU Serv

Backing up VM(s) - PMOX BU Serv

Backup session started - 2026-02-24 22:04:15

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

very strange as i just double checked on both my servers, ones on 7.1.4 and the other 7.2.3, one has exclusive enabled one has it disabled. can you show a screenshot of how you have it setup to start

4 minutes ago, The_Holocron said:

A few other notes:

1. This is a jumble, particularly if you have multiple VMs selected for backup.

2. When you click EDIT here, the EDIT button at 3 appears.

3. This EDIT button, when you click EDIT at 2, seems awkward. Perhaps this should be "SAVE" or "UPDATE"?

Love where this is going.

i like the idea of Update for the edit button at number 3 so i'll change that. for the jumbled mess of a field for number 1 when multiple vms selected i will look into it, i could ellipsis it so when its super long it's cuts off at a certain width where then hovering you can see the full field text

15 minutes ago, The_Holocron said:

A few other notes:

1. This is a jumble, particularly if you have multiple VMs selected for backup.

2. When you click EDIT here, the EDIT button at 3 appears.

3. This EDIT button, when you click EDIT at 2, seems awkward. Perhaps this should be "SAVE" or "UPDATE"?

Love where this is going.

if you are decent with using terminal and want to update the file needed to check if my fix for the jarbled mess for number 1 and the update button is working for you

8 hours ago, jcofer555 said:

if you are decent with using terminal and want to update the file needed to check if my fix for the jarbled mess for number 1 and the update button is working for you

I am not afraid of terminal... :-D

Another small thing. The indicated backup actually had errors (failed completely because of the mount points) upon finish. The notification in the Unraid notifications should ideally indicate that it failed, not just finished, and have the warning icon, similar to the other clip below.