How do I automatically back up a folder?

“I recently bought a new PC and I'm done setting everything up (downloading applications, setting settings, files and folders transfer, etc.) How do I back up all my files and folders so that if, for example, I needed to reset my hard drive because of a virus or if I got a new PC again I wouldn't have to do this again?”

Nowadays, people cannot live without files and folders on computers. Folders help you to consolidate and categorize various file data, but they are also very vulnerable to viruses and malware, so you may also have the need to backup your folders. How to choose folder backup software and file backup software? We have prepared the best 4 free options in the article and you can refer to the information below.

Best 4 free folder backup software

There are 3 free folder backup software that will be introduced here, containing cloud backup and local backup software. You can choose the suitable one according to your needs after reading the contents as follow.

Free folder backup software - CBackup

CBackup is a free cloud backup service. Its desktop client can work on Windows 11/10/8.1/8/7/XP perfectly and web app can work on all systems. If you wanna create a folder backup task, CBackup can be a nice folder auto backup software.

With the help of CBackup, you can back up folders to several public cloud drives like Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, etc. Or you can choose to back up your folders to CBackup Cloud with 5GB free cloud storage space directly.

Let’s view the highlights of CBackup here:

● Cloud to cloud sync: CBackup provides the cloud to cloud sync feature in CBackup for free. It allows you to add different accounts of Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, and FTP/SFTP to CBackup then your files and folders can be transferred between any two cloud drive accounts directly.
● Combine cloud storage: You can get more free cloud storage space with the feature. It allows you to merge unlimited cloud storage accounts to a combined cloud with a larger cloud storage space.
● Free cloud storage: CBackup gives each account 5GB of free cloud storage forever.

Then, let's see how to create an auto-backup for your folder via CBackup easily:

Add cloud drive to CBackup

1. First, download and install the CBackup desktop app on your PC. Sign up for a new CBackup account, then launch the client to log into it.

2. Click on the Storage tab. If you want to back up your folders to Google Drive, just choose Google Drive > Authorize Now. Please follow the step-by-step instructions to grant CBackup access to your Google Drive.

Create a Windows folder backup

1. Press the Backup tab and choose Backup PC to Public Cloud to backup PC folders to the cloud.

2. You can change Task Name for your folder backup task, then add your folders that need to be backed up. And, choose your Google Drive account as the backup target location.

3. If you want to set up a Google Drive auto backup folder task to save some time and effort, you can go to Settings to use the Scheduler feature for free.

4. At last, tap the Start Backup button to begin the folder backup process with such a file and folder backup software.

File and folder backup software - AOMEI Backupper Standard

AOMEI Backupper Standard is a choice of local backup software, which can be used as an automatic folder backup software. Different from cloud backup, it provides backup features to some local storage devices like local drives, USB flash drives, external hard drives, etc.

But local backup cannot protect your folders and files when local accidents happen. To protect your folders and files better, we advise you to create a backup to the cloud for data security.

If you want to try local backup, you can choose such a useful local backup tool with full backup features:

1. First, download and install the desktop client on your PC. Then run it.

2. On the home page, click Backup > File Backup.

3. Next, click on Add Folder to choose your folders to back up.

4. Choose a local storage device as the backup target location for your folders. After choosing, click the Start Backup button to begin the folder backup task.

Windows built-in backup software - Windows File History

If you do not want to download extra software and want to create a local backup of your folders, you can try the built-in Windows File History. Once you enable it on your PC, it can back up your folders and files to an external hard drive or a network location.

But it only can work on Windows 8 and later versions. And File History only supports backup Documents, Video, Music folders, and files from Desktop. If you are using an older Windows system or want to back up other folders, you can consider using CBackup for free.

Let’s see how to enable File History on your PC:

1. Go to Settings in the Windows menu, and navigate to Update & Security.

2. In the Backup options section, choose Add a drive to choose a drive for your folder backup.

3. For more advanced settings, you can click the More options under Add a drive. In the pop-up window, you can configure the frequency of backup and the length of time to save your backups.

4. You can click on Add a folder to choose more folders to back up.

5. If you do not want to backup some folders on your PC, you can select them under Exclude these folders.

Cloud backup software - OneDrive

OneDrive is another famous cloud backup service. If you want to create a folder backup in Windows 10/11, you can use OneDrive on your PC directly. But it only gives you 5GB free cloud storage.

1. Go to Settings in the Windows Start menu. Go to the System section and choose Storage.

2. Select Advanced storage settings and click Backup options in its menu.

3. Choose Manage sync setting next to the OneDrive folder syncing.

4. You can choose the folders you want to back up to OneDrive.

If your OneDrive cloud storage space is not enough for your folder backup, you can merge multiple free OneDrive accounts in CBackup to get more cloud storage space for free.

Written in the end

Among all the folder backup software, we highly recommend you use a cloud backup service for its convenience. CBackup can be the best of cloud backup tools and it provides a free plan with full backup features forever. Just go to try it on your folder backup.