Online Backup Comparison

A Comparison of Features Offered by the Best Online Backup Services

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Tim Fisher
General Manager, VP, Lifewire.com
Tim Fisher has 30+ years' professional technology support experience. He writes troubleshooting content and is the General Manager of Lifewire.
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Tim Fisher
Updated on March 01, 2021

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All online backup services offer basic features like automatic, regularly occurring, and incremental backup, as well as the ability to restore previously backed up data.

Beyond that, however, online backup services start to show their differences.

Some services allow backup from network drives while others don't. Only some allow device-to-device syncing.

With so many differences, a feature comparison chart, like the one below, can help you decide which online backup service is best for you.

Our Online Backup FAQ can help here, too. Most of the questions we've heard about cloud/online backup plans are answered there, in plain English!

Image representing cloud computing
 erhui1979 / Getty Images

Wondering where the prices are? Most online backup services have several plans that differ in price based on storage and devices supported.

See Price Comparison: Unlimited Online Backup Plans and Price Comparison: Multi-Computer Online Backup Plans for updated information.

Online Backup Service Feature Comparison

Feature Comparison Table
Feature Backblaze Carbonite Livedrive
Unlimited Plan(s) • • •
Limited Plan(s)     •
Business Plan(s) • • •
Free Trial • • •
2+ Computers per Account •   •
Multi-Device Syncing   •3 •
No File Size Limit • • •
No File Type Limits1 • •  
No Fair Use Limits • • •
No Bandwidth Throttling • • •
Windows 10 Support • • •
Windows 8/8.1 Support • • •
Windows 7 Support • • •
Windows Vista Support • • •
Windows XP Support • • •
macOS Support • • •
Real 64-bit Software • •  
iOS App • • •
Android App • • •
Windows Phone App     •
BlackBerry App   •  
Windows 10/8 App     •
Desktop File Access   • •
Web App File Access • • •
Transfer Encryption (128-bit) • •  
Transfer Encryption (256-bit) •   •
File Encryption (128-bit) • •  
File Encryption (256-bit)     •
Private Encryption Option(s) • •  
File Versioning (Limited) • • •
File Versioning (Unlimited) •    
Drive-Level Backup • •  
Folder-Level Backup • • •
File-Level Backup • •  
Backup From Mapped Drive     •
Backup From Attached Drive • •5 •
Continuous Backup (≤ 1 min) • • •
Backup Frequency Option(s) • • •
Idle Backup Option • •  
Bandwidth Control (Simple) • • •
Bandwidth Control (Advanced) •   •
Offline Backup Option(s)      
Offline Restore Option(s) • •  
Multiple Backup Destination Option(s)      
Local Backup Option(s)      
Locked/Open File Support   •  
Backup Set Option(s)      
Integrated Player/Viewer • • •
File Sharing • •3 •3
Backup Status (Email Alerts) • •  
Backup Status (Other Alerts)   • •
North America Data Center(s) • •  
Europe Data Center(s)     •
Africa Data Center(s)      
Australia Data Center(s)      
Phone Support   •  
Email Support • • •
Chat Support • •  
Forum Support      
Self Support • • •

While the feature list we've created above is pretty extensive and we've further clarified some information in the footnotes, you should investigate any online backup service's feature that you're particularly interested in before you decide to purchase one of their plans. We may have that more detailed information in our review of the service (if we have one) or you may find it in the self-support area on the backup service's website.

Features available only in a service's business-class online backup plan are not shown here.

[1] Most online service providers automatically exclude certain file types you're unlikely to want to back up (like temporary files, extremely large files, etc.) but these exclusions can be removed if you want.

[2] This feature is available in some, but not all, plans by this online backup provider.

[3] This feature is available via an extra service/program from this provider.

[4] Windows 8 Pro & 8.1 Pro are the only supported versions of Windows 8 for this backup provider's software.

[5] This feature is only available if you're using Windows and only in some of this provider's online backup plans.

[6] This feature is only available when backing up locally.​

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