Backup and Restore

Backup and Restore is a component of Microsoft Windows. It is the primary backup tool of Windows Vista and Windows 7. It can create file and folder backups, as well as system image backups that can be used for recovery in the event of data corruption, hard disk drive failure, or malware infection.

It replaced the legacy NTBackup tool that was present from Windows NT 3.51 to Windows XP and unlike its predecessor, it supports using CDs, DVDs and Blu-ray discs, but no longer tapes as backup media.

Backup and Restore was deprecated in Windows 8 in favor of File History and was removed completely in Windows 8.1. However, it returned in Windows 10 to provide compatibility for backups that were made on the legacy tool, as "Backup and Restore (Windows 7)".

The server counterpart of Backup and Restore is called Windows Server Backup.

Deprecation
With the release of Windows 8, Backup and Restore was deprecated in favor of File History. Though it retained all of its functionality for users who relied on it; the feature was moved to a Windows 7 File Recovery Control Panel applet and all previous points of access were removed. In Windows 8.1, all interface functionality with the exception of system image creation, which is in a System Image Backup option in File History, were removed. Scheduling system image backups is not supported either. WBAdmin, however, remained available.

With the release of Windows 10, the Backup and Restore (Windows 7) Control Panel applet was made available again to provide compatibility for backups that were made on the tool.

The system image functionality was deprecated with the release of Windows 10 Fall Creators Update and Microsoft recommends that users use third-party backup software.