Navigation
Use the sidebar as the main path through Borg UI. Some tabs appear only when your account has the right permission, the feature is enabled, or the current license supports it.
Normal Path
The quickest way to a first backup is New backup at the top of the sidebar. It opens Quick Start, which asks what to back up and where, then creates the repository and a scheduled backup plan for you. It appears for accounts that can create repositories.
To set things up by hand, follow the sidebar in this order:
- Open Dashboard to check overall health and spot setup gaps.
- Add storage targets from Repositories or Cloud Storage, and register infrastructure endpoints from Remote Machines or from Remote Clients with an admin account on Pro/Enterprise plans.
- Create a plan from Backup Plans.
- Configure automatic runs from the plan schedule or the Schedule page.
- Watch work in Activity and browse results in Archives.
- Adjust preferences, notifications, and system options from Settings.
Overview
| Sidebar area | Tab | Use it for |
|---|---|---|
| Top | New backup | Open Quick Start to set up a scheduled backup in a few questions. Visible to accounts that can create repositories. |
| Main | Dashboard | Check repository health, recent activity, backup freshness, restore-check status, and setup-gap actions for backup plans, cloud storage, remote clients, and verification. |
| Main | Activity | Review job history as operations: queued, running, and finished work with follow-up index steps nested under their parent, live or recent logs, and failures. |
| Infrastructure | Remote Machines | Add SSH-connected machines for remote repositories, remote backup sources, and SSH restore destinations. |
| Infrastructure | Remote Clients | Register other Borg UI client servers, check health and version compatibility from this server, and route selected requests to a remote client. Visible to admins; management requires Pro or Enterprise. |
| Infrastructure | Managed Agents | Enroll and manage Borg UI agents on remote machines. |
| Infrastructure | Cloud Storage | Configure reusable rclone remotes for Cloud Mirror targets and advanced direct Borg 2 rclone repository URLs. Requires Pro or Enterprise. |
| Storage | Repositories | Create, import, inspect, maintain, and restore from Borg repositories. A repository is the storage target. |
| Backups | Backup Plans | Define what to back up, where it should go, when it should run, and what maintenance should run afterward. |
| Backups | Backup | Run older repository-based backups or legacy backup jobs. New workflows should usually start from Backup Plans. |
| Backups | Schedule | Review scheduled repository work, scheduled restore checks, and plan schedules from one operational view. |
| Backups | Archives | Browse archives, select files or folders, restore data, and run archive-level actions. |
| Backups | Archive detail (/archives/:repositoryId/:archiveId) | Changes, Files, and Info tabs for one archive, reached from the Archives heatmap or list. |
Repository Sync Warnings
After two consecutive archive-sync failures, the affected repository card shows a compact Sync issue badge beside the Borg version. Hover or focus the badge to see the stale-data notice and last successful sync time, or click it to open the failure reason and recovery guidance. The details also show when no sync has succeeded. A single failed attempt stays in background activity; a successful sync clears the warning. The warning remains while a retry is running and is not shown when background indexing is turned off for that repository.
Settings
Settings are grouped so personal preferences stay separate from operational administration.
Personal
| Tab | Use it for |
|---|---|
| Account | Update profile details, password, passkeys, two-factor authentication, and account security. |
| Users | Manage users and repository access. This appears for accounts that can manage users. |
| Appearance | Choose theme and display preferences. |
| Preferences | Set personal UI behavior and default preferences. |
| Notifications | Configure backup, restore, schedule, check, and report notifications. This appears for admins only. |
System
| Tab | Use it for |
|---|---|
| Licensing | Manage license status and plan-gated capabilities. |
| System | Configure runtime settings, backup health thresholds, timeouts, and maintenance controls. Repository Monitoring holds the Automatic prune previews switch: turn it off and Borg UI stops comparing retention policies on its own, and the Prune Preview page runs one only when you press Compare now. |
| Monitoring & Reports | Configure backup reports, monitoring behavior, and recent activity included in reports. |
| Background work | See how many repositories are in each background stage (connect, archive list, retention preview, file history, stats), click a stage to filter the table to its repositories, pause or resume a single stage or all of them, adjust index workers, and rebuild derived data. Retention preview reads Off while automatic prune previews are turned off. Visible to admins and operators. |
| Repository settings, Advanced step | How much a repository indexes in the background (everything, archives only, or off) and the paths file history skips. Reached by editing a repository. |
| MQTT | Configure MQTT and Home Assistant integration. This appears when MQTT is enabled. |
| Cache | Configure Redis/cache behavior and clear cache entries when needed. |
| Logs | Review log storage and cleanup controls. |
| Packages | Install or inspect optional runtime packages when package management is available. |
Management
| Tab | Use it for |
|---|---|
| Mounts | Manage archive mount points and mount-related operations. |
| Scripts | Manage reusable scripts for pre-backup, post-backup, and operational hooks. |
| Export/Import | Export Borg UI configuration or import supported configuration data. |
Advanced
| Tab | Use it for |
|---|---|
| Beta | Enable or disable the beta features that still require an admin switch. |
Where To Go Next
- For a first backup, use Quick Start, or follow the Usage Guide to set it up by hand.
- For Borg UI instances on other machines, see Remote Clients.
- For SSH targets or remote sources, see Remote Machines.
- For notification setup, see Notifications.