Overview

Backrest is a web-accessible backup solution built on top of restic. Backrest provides a WebUI which wraps the restic CLI and makes it easy to create repos, browse snapshots, and restore files. Additionally, Backrest can run in the background and take an opinionated approach to scheduling snapshots and orchestrating repo health operations.

By building on restic, Backrest leverages its mature, fast, reliable, and secure backup capabilities while adding an intuitive interface.

Built with Go, Backrest is distributed as a standalone, lightweight binary with restic as its sole dependency. It can securely create new repositories or manage existing ones. Once storage is configured, the WebUI handles most operations, while still allowing direct access to the powerful restic CLI for advanced operations when needed.

Preview

Key Features

User Guide

See the Backrest docs.

Installation

Backrest is packaged as a single executable. It can be run directly on Linux, macOS, and Windows. restic will be downloaded and installed on first run.

Quick Start Options

  1. Pre-built Release: Download from the releases page
  2. Docker: Use garethgeorge/backrest:latest (Docker Hub)
    • Includes rclone and common Unix utilities
    • For minimal image, use garethgeorge/backrest:scratch
  3. Build from Source: See Building section below

Once installed, access Backrest at http://localhost:9898 (default port). First-time setup will prompt for username and password creation.

[!NOTE] To change the default port, set the BACKREST_PORT environment variable (e.g., BACKREST_PORT=0.0.0.0:9898 to listen on all interfaces)

Backrest will use your system's installed version of restic if it's available and compatible. If not, Backrest will download and install a suitable version in its data directory, keeping it updated. To use a specific restic binary, set the BACKREST_RESTIC_COMMAND environment variable to the desired path.

Running with Docker Compose

Docker image: https://hub.docker.com/r/garethgeorge/backrest

Example compose file:

version: "3.8"
services:
  backrest:
    image: garethgeorge/backrest:latest
    container_name: backrest
    hostname: backrest
    volumes:
      - ./backrest/data:/data
      - ./backrest/config:/config
      - ./backrest/cache:/cache
      - ./backrest/tmp:/tmp
      - /path/to/backup/data:/userdata  # Mount local paths to backup
      - /path/to/local/repos:/repos     # Mount local repos (optional for remote storage)
    environment:
      - BACKREST_DATA=/data
      - BACKREST_CONFIG=/config/config.json
      - XDG_CACHE_HOME=/cache
      - TMPDIR=/tmp
      - TZ=America/Los_Angeles
    ports:
      - "9898:9898"
    restart: unless-stopped

Running on Linux

Running on Linux

  1. Download the Release

  2. Installation Options

    a) Using the Install Script (Recommended)

    mkdir backrest && tar -xzvf backrest_Linux_x86_64.tar.gz -C backrest
cd backrest && sudo ./install.sh

    This script will:

    • Move the Backrest binary to /usr/local/bin
    • Create and start a systemd service

    b) Manual Installation with systemd

    sudo mv backrest /usr/local/bin/backrest
sudo tee /etc/systemd/system/backrest.service > /dev/null <<EOT
[Unit]
Description=Backrest
After=network.target

[Service]
Type=simple
User=$(whoami)
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/backrest
Environment="BACKREST_PORT=127.0.0.1:9898"

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
EOT
sudo systemctl enable --now backrest

    c) Using cron (Basic)

    sudo mv backrest /usr/local/bin/backrest
(crontab -l 2>/dev/null; echo "@reboot /usr/local/bin/backrest") | crontab -

  3. Verify Installation

    • Access Backrest at http://localhost:9898
    • For the systemd service: sudo systemctl status backrest

[!NOTE] Adjust the User in the systemd service file if needed. The install script and manual systemd instructions use your current user by default.

By default backrest listens only on localhost, you can open optionally open it up to remote connections by setting the BACKREST_PORT environment variable. For systemd installations, run sudo systemctl edit backrest and add:

[Service]
Environment="BACKREST_PORT=0.0.0.0:9898"

Using 0.0.0.0 allows connections from any interface.

Arch Linux

[!Note] Backrest on AUR is not maintained by the Backrest official and has made minor adjustments to the recommended services. Please refer to here for details. In backrest@.service, use restic from the Arch Linux official repository by setting BACKREST_RESTIC_COMMAND. And for information on enable/starting/stopping services, please refer to Systemd#Using_units.

## Install Backrest from AUR
paru -Sy backrest  # or: yay -Sy backrest

## Enable Backrest service for current user
sudo systemctl enable --now backrest@$USER.service

Running on macOS

Using Homebrew (Recommended)

Backrest is available via a Homebrew tap:

brew tap garethgeorge/homebrew-backrest-tap
brew install backrest
brew services start backrest

This method uses Brew Services to manage Backrest. It will launch on startup and run on port 127.0.0.1:9898 by default.

[!NOTE] You may need to grant Full Disk Access to Backrest. Go to System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Privacy > Full Disk Access and add /usr/local/bin/backrest.

Manual Installation

  1. Download the latest Darwin release from the releases page.
  2. Extract and install:
mkdir backrest && tar -xzvf backrest_Darwin_arm64.tar.gz -C backrest
cd backrest && ./install.sh

The install script will:

[!TIP] Review the script before running to ensure you're comfortable with its operations.

Running on Windows

Windows Installer

Download the Windows installer for your architecture from the releases page. The installer, named Backrest-setup-[arch].exe, will place Backrest and a GUI tray application in %localappdata%\Programs\Backrest\. The tray application, set to start on login, monitors Backrest.

[!TIP] To override the default port before installation, set a user environment variable named BACKREST_PORT. On Windows 10+, navigate to Settings > About > Advanced system settings > Environment Variables. Under "User variables", create a new variable with the value "127.0.0.1:port" (e.g., "127.0.0.1:8080" for port 8080). If changing post-installation, re-run the installer to update shortcuts with the new port.

Configuration

Environment Variables (Unix)

Variable Description Default
BACKREST_PORT Port to bind to 127.0.0.1:9898 (or 0.0.0.0:9898 for the docker images)
BACKREST_CONFIG Path to config file $HOME/.config/backrest/config.json
(or, if $XDG_CONFIG_HOME is set, $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/backrest/config.json)
BACKREST_DATA Path to the data directory $HOME/.local/share/backrest
(or, if $XDG_DATA_HOME is set, $XDG_DATA_HOME/backrest)
BACKREST_RESTIC_COMMAND Path to restic binary Defaults to a Backrest managed version of restic at $XDG_DATA_HOME/backrest/restic-x.x.x
XDG_CACHE_HOME Path to the cache directory

Environment Variables (Windows)

Variable Description Default
BACKREST_PORT Port to bind to 127.0.0.1:9898
BACKREST_CONFIG Path to config file %appdata%\backrest
BACKREST_DATA Path to the data directory %appdata%\backrest\data
BACKREST_RESTIC_COMMAND Path to restic binary Defaults to a Backrest managed version of restic in C:\Program Files\restic\restic-x.x.x
XDG_CACHE_HOME Path to the cache directory

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! See the issues or feel free to open a new issue to discuss a project. Beyond the core codebase, contributions to documentation, cookbooks, and testing are always welcome.

Build Depedencies

(Optional) To Edit Protobuffers

apt install -y protobuf-compiler
go install google.golang.org/grpc/cmd/protoc-gen-go-grpc@latest
go install github.com/bufbuild/buf/cmd/buf@v1.47.2
go install github.com/fullstorydev/grpcurl/cmd/grpcurl@latest
go install google.golang.org/protobuf/cmd/protoc-gen-go@latest
go install connectrpc.com/connect/cmd/protoc-gen-connect-go@latest
npm install -g @bufbuild/protoc-gen-es

Compiling

(cd webui && npm i && npm run build)
(cd cmd/backrest && go build .)

Using VSCode Dev Containers

You can also use VSCode with Dev Containers extension to quickly get up and running with a working development and debugging environment.

  1. Make sure Docker and VSCode with Dev Containers extension is installed
  2. Clone this repository
  3. Open this folder in VSCode
  4. When prompted, click on Open in Container button, or run > Dev Containers: Rebuild and Reopen in Containers command
  5. When container is started, go to Run and Debug, choose Debug Backrest (backend+frontend) and run it

[!NOTE] Provided launch configuration has hot reload for typescript frontend.