Snapshots in Early Access
The new Backup & restore page in the Neon Console, which introduces the new snapshots feature, is available for members of our Early Access Program. Read more about joining up here.
Use the Backup & restore page in the Neon Console to instantly restore a branch to a previous state or create and restore snapshots of your data. This feature combines instant point-in-time restore and snapshots to help you recover from accidental changes, data loss, or schema issues.
What you can do
- ✅ Instantly restore a branch
- ✅ Preview data before restoring
- ✅ Create snapshots manually
- ✅ Restore from a snapshot
Instantly restore a branch
Instantly restore your branch to a specific time in its history.
Instant restore is only supported for root branches. Typically, this is your project's
productionbranch. Learn more.
You can restore from any time that falls within your project's restore window.
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Select a time
Click the date & time selector, choose a date & time, and click Restore.
You'll see a confirmation modal that outlines what will happen:
- Your branch will be restored to its state at the selected date & time
- Your current branch will be saved as a backup, in case you want to revert
At this point, you can either click Restore to proceed or select Preview data to inspect the data first.
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Preview the data
To preview the data to make sure you’ve selected the right restore point, you can:
- Browse data in the Tables view to explore a read-only view of the data at the selected point in time
- Query data directly from the restore page to run read-only SQL against the selected restore point
- Compare schemas with the schema diff tool to see how your current schema differs from the one at the selected restore point
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Restore
Click Restore to complete the restore operation, or Cancel to back out. You can also restore directly from any of the Preview data pages.
When you restore, a backup branch is automatically created (named
<branch_name>_old_<timestamp>) in case you need to revert back. You can find this branch on the Branches page.
For information about removing backup branches, see Deleting backup branches.
Create snapshots manually
Snapshots capture the state of your branch at a point in time. You can create snapshots manually (on root branches only). You can restore to these snapshots from any branch in your project.
To create a snapshot manually, click Create snapshot. This captures the current state of your data and saves it as a Manual snapshot. It's a good idea to create a snapshot before making significant changes to your schema or data.
Restore from a snapshot
You can restore from any snapshot in your project using one of two methods:
- One-step restore – Instantly restore data from the snapshot into the existing branch. The branch name and connection string remain the same, but the branch ID changes.
- Multi-step restore – Create a new branch from the snapshot. Use this option if you want to inspect or test the data before switching to the new branch.
One-step restore
Use this option if you want to restore the snapshot data immediately without inspecting the data first.
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Locate the snapshot you want to use and click Restore → One-step restore.
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The One-step restore modal explains the operation:
- The restore operation will occur instantly.
- The current branch will be restored to the snapshot state.
- A branch named
<branch_name (old)>will be created as a backup. Other snapshots you may have taken previously remain attached to this branch.
Click Restore to proceed with the operation.
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Your branch is immediately restored to the snapshot state, and the
<branch_name>_oldbranch is created, which you'll find on the Branches page in the Neon Console, as shown here:
After you verify that the restore operation was successful, you can delete the backup branch if you no longer need it. However, please note that any snapshots taken previously remain attached to this branch. If you need to keep them, we recommend retaining this branch.
Multi-step restore
Use this option if you need to inspect the restored data before you switch over to the new branch.
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Locate the snapshot you want to use and click Restore → Multi-step restore.
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The Multi-step restore modal explains the operation:
- The restore will occur instantly
- Your current branch will remain unchanged
- A new branch with the snapshot data will be created
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Clicking Restore creates the new branch with the restored data and directs you to the Branch overview page where you can:
- Get connection details for the new branch to preview the data restored from the snapshot
- Migrate connections and settings to move your database URLs and compute settings from the old branch to the new branch so you don't have to update the connection configuration in your application
Need help?
Join our Discord Server to ask questions or see what others are doing with Neon. For paid plan support options, see Support.