How to Backup a Discord Server

Discord keeps no copy of your server. If channels are deleted, roles are wiped or someone with the wrong permissions has a bad idea, the audit log tells you what happened and nothing puts it back. Support will not restore a server, and the audit log itself ages out.

A backup is the only thing that does. This takes about a minute to set up.

The one command

Add Xenon from the home page, then, in the server:

/backup create

Xenon walks the server and replies with a backup id. Creating requires administrator permission; the backup is stored on your Discord account, not on the server, and nothing deletes it on a timer.

/backup list shows everything you have saved.

Make it automatic, because you will forget

A backup you took in March does not describe the server you have now.

/backup interval on 24h

Xenon then saves on its own. Twenty-four hours is the floor on the free tier; Premium goes down to four. Free keeps one interval backup per server, overwriting it each time, and Premium keeps up to eight, so you can pick a point before a problem rather than the most recent snapshot, which may already contain it.

Interval backups show up in /backup list with a clock next to the id.

What a backup holds

Everything structural is free:

• Channels and categories, in order
• Roles, in order, with their colors and permissions
• Permission overwrites per channel, the part that takes an evening to rebuild by hand
• Server settings

Premium adds the things that need storage: threads and forum posts, up to 250 messages per channel, bans, nicknames and role assignments.

Two things no backup holds. Members. Discord provides no way to move or restore an account’s membership, so a rebuilt server still needs people to rejoin. And reactions and edits on restored messages, because Premium reposts messages through a webhook, so they are copies wearing the original author’s name and avatar.

Restoring

/backup load backup_id: 434ATZPVLA

Loading replaces the channels and roles that are there now. It does not kick anyone. Xenon confirms first, and a large server takes a few minutes because Discord rate limits how fast channels and roles can be created.

You can restore part of it. The options argument takes settings members channels delete-channels roles delete-roles bans invite pins, with ! in front to turn one off:

/backup load backup_id: 434ATZPVLA options: !* roles delete-roles

That puts the roles back and leaves the channels alone: the right move when someone deleted the role hierarchy and nothing else.

Worth knowing before you need it

Backups belong to the account that made them. Nobody else can load yours, and you cannot hand one over. If the person who set up backups leaves, the backups leave with them. On a server with a team, more than one admin should be running /backup create.

Loading is owner-only by default. Deliberately, because it is the most destructive thing the bot can do. /settings permissions opens it up if your moderators need it.

Check the message count. On Premium, /backup create message_count: 250 saves the maximum your tier allows. The default is already your tier’s maximum, so this only matters if you want fewer.

A backup of a broken server is a broken backup. If you are about to restructure, take one first and leave it alone. Interval backups will happily overwrite themselves with the aftermath.

Going deeper on one channel

A backup spends its message budget across every channel, which is the wrong way to archive a busy support or announcement channel. /chatlog create does the opposite: one channel, up to 1,000 messages, repostable anywhere you administrate. Premium only.

Add Xenon and run /backup create; it takes a few seconds. More on what backups cover, or how to copy a server to another one if the reason you want a backup is a move.