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Do I need to backup our SharePoint files

cja-tech-guy
cja-tech-guy asked
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We are looking to move files from our on premises file servers to SharePoint.  We want to have 100% cloud storage over the next year or so. Moving files to SharePoint would be our first step into that process.  

Do I need to backup the SharePoint files/folders to Azure?  I know SharePoint has revision history so users can see previous versions of files in case a file gets overwritten by mistake.  

Does SharePoint have a recycle bin for deleted files?

Does Microsoft provide redundancy for our SharePoint site in case they (Microsoft) have a failure?  

Any comments/suggestions about using SharePoint for file storage is appreciated.  

Thanks,
cja
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Senior Systems Admin
Top Expert 2010
Commented:

There is a recycle bin, and you can enable versioning on any sharepoint site to allow rollback in the event of errors. 

https://support.office.com/en-us/article/enable-and-configure-versioning-for-a-list-or-library-1555d642-23ee-446a-990a-bcab618c7a37

Redundancy is built in to all O365 services. There are 3 copies of the SharePoint data distributed among different datacenters, so if a server fails on the back end, a different server takes over immediately and silently. 


You don't *need* to have backup with sharepoint, particularly if you have an E3 license, which includes archiving (this gives you the ability to implement InPlace Hold to retain file data indefinitely). If you have sub-E3 licensing, you can purchase the archiving package for 2 bucks a month.  So if you can find an o365 backup solution that costs less than $2 per user/month, you're welcome to purchase that service as a backup solution, just understand that it may not be strictly necessary because of the built in redundancy for Office 365. 

cja-tech-guy

Author

Commented:
Thanks Adam. I will look further into this but you have answered my questions.

cja
Philip ElderTechnical Architect - HA/Compute/Storage

Commented:
The end user is _always_ responsible for backing up their data no matter where the data lies.

Veeam Backup & Replication for Office 365 is the best for that.