Mac: Does Backblaze back up the Library folder? Mac: Does Backblaze back up the Library folder?

Mac: Does Backblaze back up the Library folder?

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Backblaze backs up /Users/yourusername/Library or ~/Library

Backblaze does not back up /Library

What's the difference between those two Library folders?

Mac OS X contains two Library folders:

• A user level Library for each user at /Users/yourusername/Library or ~/Library

• A top level Library folder at /Library

The user level Library contains items like settings for Mail, Safari, and many third party apps; calendars, address book, emails, etc. A significant amount of unique, user data is stored in that folder.

(Note: The user level Library may be hidden depending on your version of Mac OS X)

The top level Library folder contains primarily non-unique operating system files and caches.

What Library does Backblaze back up?

By default, Backblaze backs up all user level Library folders at /Users/yourusername/Library or ~/Library

This means that user-created data, like settings/preferences, mail, browser bookmarks, calendars, address book data, widgets, etc. are all backed up by Backblaze.

What Library doesn't Backblaze back up?

Backblaze won't back up the top level /Library folder, as it primarily contains non-unique data. By not backing up this data, it makes your backup complete faster, with less bandwidth used. In turn backups use less space on our servers storing non-unique data, so we can continue to offer a low priced, unlimited storage product.

The data in /Library is re-created when an operating system is installed, and when applications are reinstalled. Users do not have to directly interact with files in /Library in most circumstances.

If you have data in the top level Library folder that you wish to back up, make a copy of it to a location that Backblaze does back up. There is no way to override /Library to include it in your backup.