License Editions: For license details, see Plans & Pricing.

Overview

The Smart Backup feature for SharePoint Online sites leverages an intelligent site change detection algorithm to selectively backup sites whose content has been modified, thereby skipping redundant backups of sites without content changes and optimizing resource utilization.

Smart Backup Workflow

This section explains how Smart Backup works.

Step 1 - Identify Backup Type

Manual or Full Scan Requested?
- Yes: Launch a normal or full scan backup.
- No: Proceed to check for site modification time (mtime) changes.

Step 2 - Check if mtime is updated

Changes Detected?
- Yes: Initiate a normal Backup for the containers that have been modified.
- No: The last restore point is committed as the current restore point and backup process is completed.

📝Note

Smart Backups rely on site modification time (mtime) to determine whether a backup is necessary.

Any changes to file permissions, settings, change in views or UI language, user alerts alone won't trigger a backup, since these changes typically don't alter the mtime. However, Smart Backups still capture these changes during mandatory backups, which are scheduled at user-defined intervals (2-90 days, default: 7 days)

To learn more about the parameters that influence mtime, refer to the Factors Triggering SharePoint Site Backups below.

Benefits of enabling Smart Backup

Implementing Smart Backup can help;

Accelerated backups by skipping scans for unchanged sites.
Reduces API consumption for such sites.
Saves up time and API bandwidth to process incremental scans for other sites with changes.

📝Note

Smart Backup exclusively supports Graph API backups. If Smart Backup is enabled for sites utilizing REST API backup, regular backups will be performed for them.

Enable or Disable Smart Backup

When creating a new Org App Backup Profile, you have the option to enable or disable Smart Settings.

During the profile creation process, you’ll be prompted to configure this setting in the Settings tab of the Profile creation wizard. Smart Backup is enabled by default, but you can uncheck the option if you prefer to disable it.

📝NOTE:

Druva uses a Single App implementation for backing up SharePoint sites. In this model, the backup settings—such as schedules, retention policies, and Smart Backup options—are managed by the parent applications: Microsoft 365 Groups and Teams.

How Smart Settings Are Applied

SharePoint sites associated with Microsoft 365 Groups or Teams inherit Smart Settings from their respective Groups or Teams backup profiles. These settings cannot be customized at the SharePoint site level. Any changes must be made within the corresponding Group or Team profile.
Classic SharePoint sites (not linked to Groups or Teams) are governed by the SharePoint-specific backup profile. You can define custom schedules, retention settings, and Smart Backup options for these standalone sites.

To learn more about the priority refer to the Auto Configuration Rules Priority

Factors Triggering SharePoint Site Backups

The backup process is initiated when the following actions are performed on a SharePoint site:

Content Management

Creating attachments, content types, distribution lists, folders, lists, list items, subsites, and views
Uploading documents
Adding columns, site columns, and quick launch items
Updating columns, distribution lists settings, and views
Deleting content and columns
Restoring from the recycle bin
Changing file metadata