It is too late to back up your MacBook when you fail to access those files. Even though you are careful enough about the security of your Mac computer, it is hard to tell whether you can protect its inner data. In another word, your Mac can be attacked by many situations including malwares, system crashes, update failure, accidental deletion, etc. To avoid those embarrassing cases, you had better backup Mac to iCloud to make a copy.
If you want to backup Mac without external hard drive, then iCloud is one of your best Mac backup software. You do not need to prepare an external storage tool to backup Mac since iCloud offers 5GB free Cloud storage space and related plans. Therefore, this article aims to show you how to backup MacBook to iCloud quickly and easily.
Apr 29, 2020 Make sure that iCloud Backup is turned on in Settings your name iCloud iCloud Backup. Connect your device to a power source. Connect your device to a Wi-Fi network. Make sure that your device's screen is locked. Mar 06, 2020 MSP360 Cloud Backup for Mac MSP360 (formerly Cloudberry) is a unique cloud backup solution because you control where your backup goes. You can use Amazon S3 and Glacier, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Storage, OpenStack, RackSpace, HP Cloud, Backblaze B2, and more. CloudBacko can be installed on Windows, Mac OS X, thus allowing you to backup all your machines with the same solution. Clear insights and reporting With CloudBacko's reporting tool, you can get clear visibility into the backup details of all destinations, including usage trend, backup and restore reports, log for warnings and errors, etc. Backup Mac to cloud storage of your choice or set up local backup if you want to send only a subset of your data to the cloud and keep the rest on your local backup storage. Network Locations Backup Back up your network locations including network shares, NAS devices, mapped drives, etc.
Part 1: Why do You Need to Back Up MacBook to iCloud
Jan 17, 2020 Ideally, you should have both a local backup and an off-site or online backup to the cloud. A local backup is where you copy the data from your Mac to an external hard drive. Both copies are in the same place so you can easily access the data, keep it up-to-date, or restore it if you have to.
Just as above has mentioned, nowadays digital devices are easily influenced by virus and malware attacks including your MacBook Pro or MacBook Air. If you cannot afford the data loss damage, then absolutely you need to backup MacBook Pro to external hard drive or cloud storage space. And these two methods are also widely-used by most Mac users to protect MacBook data.
Some people may still wonder is it better to backup Mac to external hard drive using Disk Utility or Time Machine. Well, you cannot deny the advantages of backing up MacBook to an external hard drive, but you can also benefit a lot from iCloud backup. For instance, you can access the backup information over the air. So it does not matter whether the condition of your external hard drive is good or not. And once you sign into your iCloud account, you can restore data on any Apple product directly. As a result, you could move Time Machine backup to iCloud for further usage. And these are reasons why the Mac needs iCloud backup.
Part 2: How to Backup MacBook to iCloud
Once you set up iCloud to back up files on your Mac, it can work automatically. Furthermore, you can restore all data from iCloud backup to a new Mac over the air. Even though there is only 5 GB free iCloud storage, you can still upgrade it with the flexible plan to manage. So using iCloud to backup Mac without Time Machine is quit.
Step 1. Update your Mac
Open the Apple menu and choose 'Software Update' to see whether there is an available update. You need to make sure your MacBook is running the latest OS X version before backing up MacBook to iCloud.
Step 2. Turn on iCloud to backup MacBook
Run 'System Preferences' from the Apple menu as well. Then find 'iCloud' and click it. Sign into iCloud account with your Apple ID and password. You can see all available file types to backup including photos, mail, contacts, calendars, reminders, etc. Thus, it is quite easy if you intend to backup documents to iCloud on Mac.
Step 3. Enable iCloud photos backup settings on Mac
Click 'Options' next to 'Photos', and then you can tick iCloud Photo Library, My Photo Stream and iCloud Photo Sharing according to your personal needs. After that, you can import recent photos and access videos among all Apple devices wirelessly. With all these have been done, it will start backing up MacBook to iCloud drive automatically.
More details about uploading photos from Mac to iCloud are here.
Step 4. Enable auto downloads in iTunes
You can also open iTunes and locate its Preferences to adjust iTunes auto backup on Mac. Choose 'Downloads' and tick before Music, Movies and TV Shows to backup available files wirelessly. Tap 'OK' to save your change.
If the left iCloud storage is not enough to store your entire Mac to iCloud backup, you can hit 'Manage' button in the lower right corner to upgrade to a larger storage plan, which starts with 50GB for only $0.99 per month.
Don't Miss: Best methods to find iPhone backup on Mac
Bonus Tips: Backup & Restore Mac with Time Machine
For people who still want to backup MacBook Air and MacBook Pro using Time Machine, you can operate following steps to solve the problem.
Section 1: How to Backup MacBook to External Hard Drive
Step 1. Set up Time Machine
Connect your external hard drive to a Mac computer, and choose 'Use as Backup Disk' when you are prompted to use it to backup Mac with Time Machine.
Step 2. Backup MacBook to external hard drive
Choose 'Back Up Now' to backup Mac data to your external hard drive. Moreover, tick 'Back Up Automatically' to make hourly/daily/weekly backups automatically if necessary. The first time you use Time Machine to back up your Mac computer, it will take longer time to complete the MacBook backup process.
Section 2: How to Restore Mac with Time Machine Backup![]()
Step 1. Open the window you want to restore
For instance, you need to open the Documents folder if you want to restore a document that is deleted accidentally.
Step 2. Restore MacBook from Time Machine
Open Time Machine menu and choose 'Enter Time Machine' to find the specific file from your previous backup file. Press Space Bar to preview in detail. Finally, hit 'Restore' to restore Mac data from Time Machine selectively.
If you want to restore your Mac data entirely, you can choose 'Restore from Time Machine' utility in macOS Recovery.
With above system backup and iCloud backup methods, you can handle key points of backing up Mac data in detail. If those files are really important, then you had better backup MacBook to iCloud and Time machine at the same time. That's all of how to backup MacBook to iCloud. Feel free to contact us if you have any problem during the Mac backup and restore process.
Time Machine or another local backup tool for macOS should be your first line of defense. You should always have a way to recover if you delete an important file or if your hard drive fails. But backup hard drives can go bad. What's more, if you have a major catastrophe, like a robbery, house fire, or flood, you could lose your backups along with your primaries. To make sure your backup strategy is complete, you need to take it offsite and a simple way of doing that is to take it online. That's right — to the cloud!
BackblazeHow to backup
How to restore
For my money, Backblaze offers a superior interface and is easy to use. Also, Backblaze by default excludes things like apps, which will dramatically bulk up your first backup and slow you down. I consider that a plus, because I can reinstall most of those if I need to.
Backblaze pros and cons
Backblaze punts your restore to a web site, which I find a bit disruptive; I do wish the app would integrate restoration. But my major beef with Backblaze is its pricing structure. It's $5 per month per computer. That sounds great if you only have one computer, but whole households will have a bit more difficult of a time: If you have a family of four, each with their own computer, and two with laptops, that's $30 per month, total.
CarboniteHow to backup
How to restore
Carbonite pros and cons
First off, it's named after carbonite from Star Wars — already a win. Carbonite offers options for home use (individual and family plans) and also offers plans for businesses, which can include both cloud backup and on-site backup. The user interface is quite pleasant and easy to use — not cluttered or overly complex.
That being said, I've found Carbonite often slower than other online backup services — it's more of a set-it-and-forget-it kind of backup process. According to Carbonite's speed records, it can take weeks to restore 1TB of data; faster services can do the same transfer in days. You also won't get a personal encryption key for your Mac as with the PC version of Carbonite, according to Top Ten Reviews.
iDriveHow to backupBest Cloud Backup Software For Mac
How to restore
iDrive pros and cons
iDrive's biggest con is the fact that it's not even a little bit free — no free trial, nothing. However, that's also because the smallest amount of storage you can buy is 1TB for personal use and 250GB for businesses.
That being said, iDrive is a very secure way to store precious data, with native 256-bit AES encryption and two-factor authentication, and their iDrive Express service recognizes that backing up 1TB to the cloud is a colossal bandwidth suck. Here's iDrive Express in a nutshell: Once yearly for personal users and three times a year for business users, iDrive will send out a 1TB external hard drive. You then back up your data and mail it back in a prepaid priority post envelope. The service is free and can save you a ton of time and bandwidth.
ArqHow to backupBest Backup Software For Mac
How to restore
Arq pros and cons
The main con is that Arq is essentially a middle man. It doesn't house your data in its own centers, rather it acts as a vehicle for managing data in your existing cloud storage services.
That being said, a huge pro is that you can have Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive, and other cloud storage options all in one spot, so you can manage all of your data right in one app. The other great part is that you only pay $50 once and then you own Arq — no yearly subscriptions or any of that annoying nonsense. Just know that you'll be using your existing cloud services for actual storage.
AcronisHow to backup
How to restore
Acronis pros and cons
Acronis has a lot going for it, both as a vehicle for cloud storage and as its own cloud storage service. If upgrade, you can get 250GB or 1TB of storage with the company itself. The Mac client is also Touch Bar-compatible for the folks with recent MacBook Pros.
The biggest downside is how few features you receive with the one-time $50 fee. You get about half of what you'd get with the $100/year, 1TB subscription and only two-thirds of what you'd get with the $50/year, 250GB subscription. You do, however, get great savings by signing up more than one computer (5 computers are only $100 to start).
Bottom line
In the end, we strongly suggest giving one of these services a try. On-site backups are a good first step, but off-site backups keep your personal data secure in the event of a catastrophe, water leak, burglary, or pet problem.
It won't cost you anything for either Backblaze or Carbonite's free trials: See which you like best and go with that one. They're both reliable services, and they all offer an iOS app that lets you view your backups and even access your files when you need to.
What's more, if you're on the road for an extended period — on a business trip or vacation, for example — and away from your usual means of backup, it's good to know that you have another system that you can set and forget and use in a pinch if you need to recover a file or a drive.
What online backup service do you use?
If you already have an online backup service and you recommend it, let me know which one and why. If you try any of these out, let me know how you like them. If I missed your favorite, tell me all about it in the comments below!
Updated March 2020: Up-to-date for 2020.
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