Backup & Restore

TigerGraph provides robust, online backup and restore capabilities. Backups can be stored locally on the server or remotely in an Amazon S3 bucket.

1. Core Backup Operations

Backups in TigerGraph are online operations, meaning the database remains available for reads and writes while the backup is being created.

Creating a Backup

Use the gadmin backup command with a descriptive tag:

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# Create a backup with an automatic timestamp suffix
gadmin backup create weekly

# Create a backup with a custom tag only
gadmin backup create weekly-v1 --custom-tag

2. Backup Strategy

• Full Backup: A complete snapshot of the database at a point in time.
• Incremental Backup: Only records the changes since the last full backup, saving storage space and time.
• S3 Integration: Configure remote storage using gadmin config to ensure data durability even if the local server fails.

3. Restoration

Restoring a database replaces the current graph data with the contents of a backup.

Restore to Same Cluster

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gadmin backup restore <tag>

Advanced Restore Options

• Cross-Cluster Restore: Moving data from a development cluster to a production cluster.
• Point-in-Time Restore: Restoring to a specific timestamp within an incremental backup chain.

[!CAUTION] Restore is a destructive operation. It will overwrite all current data. Always ensure you have a fresh snapshot before performing a restore.

4. Configuration

Before running backups, you must define your storage path and retention policy:

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gadmin config set System.Backup.Local.FilePath "/path/to/backups"
gadmin config apply -y