Self-Hosted Alternatives to Backblaze
Why Replace Backblaze?
Backblaze Personal costs $99/year for unlimited backup, but you’re locked into their client, their retention policies, and their infrastructure. If they change pricing (it’s gone up from $5/month to $9/month since 2023), you have no leverage. Your data lives on someone else’s servers with their encryption keys.
Backblaze B2 is more flexible ($6/TB/month for storage + $0.01/GB for downloads) but costs add up fast with multi-TB datasets — 10 TB costs ~$60/month in storage alone, plus egress fees.
Self-hosting your backup infrastructure gives you:
- Full encryption control — you hold the keys, not a third party
- No vendor lock-in — switch storage backends without re-uploading everything
- Predictable costs — a 14 TB hard drive costs ~$200 one-time vs. $840/year on B2
- No egress fees — restore as much as you want without per-GB download charges
- Flexible retention — keep backups as long as you want without policy restrictions
Best Alternatives
Kopia — Best Overall Replacement
Kopia is a modern backup tool with a built-in web UI, encryption, deduplication, and compression. It supports local storage, NFS, SFTP, and S3-compatible backends. The web dashboard makes managing backup policies and monitoring status easy without CLI knowledge.
Why it’s the best replacement: Kopia’s web UI provides a similar “set it and forget it” experience to Backblaze’s desktop client, but you control where the data goes. Built-in scheduling, email notifications, and repository management make it the most complete self-hosted backup solution.
Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Kopia
Restic — Best for Power Users
Restic is a fast, secure backup program that encrypts and deduplicates everything by default. It’s CLI-only but has the largest ecosystem of third-party tools — pair it with Borgmatic for automated scheduling, or use Autorestic for a simpler config file approach.
Why it works: Restic’s wide storage backend support (S3, B2, SFTP, local, REST) means you can back up to your own NAS, a second server, or even keep Backblaze B2 as a backend while controlling the encryption keys yourself.
Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Restic
BorgBackup + Borgmatic — Best for Automation
BorgBackup provides excellent deduplication and compression, while Borgmatic wraps it with scheduled backups, retention policies, and monitoring hooks. The combination is popular in the self-hosting community for its reliability and mature codebase.
Why it works: Borgmatic’s configuration-as-YAML approach makes it easy to define multiple backup targets, retention schedules, and pre/post hooks. It’s the closest to a “configure once, run forever” backup solution.
Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Borgmatic
Duplicati — Best for Beginners
Duplicati has a web-based interface for configuring backups without touching the command line. It supports 20+ storage backends and includes scheduling, encryption, and incremental backups.
Why it works: If you’re replacing Backblaze because you want control but don’t want to learn CLI tools, Duplicati’s web UI is the gentlest learning curve.
Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Duplicati
Migration Guide
From Backblaze Personal
Backblaze Personal doesn’t offer a standard export format. To migrate:
- Identify what you’re backing up — Backblaze Personal backs up your entire drive. Decide which directories actually matter.
- Set up your self-hosted backup tool — install Kopia or Restic on your machine
- Configure your backup repository — point it at your storage (NAS, second drive, remote server)
- Run your first full backup — this takes time depending on data size
- Verify the backup — restore a few files to confirm integrity
- Cancel Backblaze — only after verifying your self-hosted backups work
From Backblaze B2
If you’re using B2 as a storage backend with a third-party client, you can keep B2 while switching clients. Restic and Kopia both support B2 natively:
# Restic with B2
restic -r b2:bucket-name:/ init
# Kopia with B2
kopia repository create b2 --bucket bucket-nameThis gives you self-hosted encryption (you hold the keys) while still using B2’s infrastructure.
Cost Comparison
| Backblaze Personal | Backblaze B2 (10 TB) | Self-Hosted (NAS) | Self-Hosted (Second VPS) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly cost | $9/month | ~$60/month | $0 (after hardware) | $5-20/month |
| Annual cost | $108/year | ~$720/year | $0 | $60-240/year |
| 3-year cost | $324 | ~$2,160 | ~$200-400 (hardware) | $180-720 |
| Storage limit | Unlimited (one computer) | Pay per TB | Your hardware | VPS disk limit |
| Restore cost | Free (slow) or $189 (drive shipped) | $0.01/GB download | Free | Free |
| Encryption | Backblaze holds keys | You manage (with self-hosted client) | You hold keys | You hold keys |
| Retention | 1 year (extended: 1 year max) | Your choice | Your choice | Your choice |
What You Give Up
- Zero-effort setup. Backblaze Personal is install-and-forget. Self-hosted backups require initial configuration and occasional maintenance.
- Unlimited storage on one plan. Backblaze Personal’s $9/month for unlimited storage is hard to beat on pure cost-per-TB. Self-hosting only wins economically at smaller data sizes or when you already own the hardware.
- Geographic redundancy. Backblaze stores data in multiple data centers. Self-hosting to a single NAS or server means one point of failure. Mitigate this by backing up to multiple destinations (local NAS + remote server).
- Mobile backup. Backblaze has mobile apps for automatic phone backup. Self-hosted alternatives for mobile backup are less polished (Syncthing, Immich for photos).
FAQ
Can self-hosted backups match Backblaze’s unlimited storage for $9/month?
Not at per-TB cost — Backblaze Personal is hard to beat for raw capacity. Self-hosting wins at smaller data sizes (under 5 TB) or when you already own NAS hardware. A 14 TB drive costs ~$200 one-time versus $840/year on B2. For unlimited cloud-like capacity, pair self-hosted backup software with cheap S3-compatible storage like Wasabi ($6.99/TB/month, no egress fees).
How do I ensure my self-hosted backups survive a house fire or theft?
Follow the 3-2-1 rule: 3 copies, 2 different media, 1 offsite. Back up locally to a NAS, then replicate to a remote VPS or S3-compatible storage. Both Restic and Kopia support multiple backup destinations in a single configuration. The offsite copy provides disaster recovery without depending on Backblaze.
Which tool should I pick if I’ve never used command-line backup tools?
Kopia or Duplicati. Both have web-based UIs for configuring backup schedules, retention policies, and storage targets without touching the command line. Kopia’s UI is more modern and the tool performs better on large datasets. Duplicati has slightly more storage backend options.
Can Restic or Kopia back up a running database without corruption?
Both tools back up files at a point in time, but databases need consistent snapshots. Run pg_dump or mysqldump before the backup job using a pre-backup hook script. Borgmatic has built-in database hooks — add your database connection details to the config and it handles dump-before-backup automatically.
How long does the initial full backup take compared to Backblaze?
The initial backup depends on data size and destination bandwidth. Backing up 1 TB to a local NAS takes 2-4 hours over gigabit LAN. Backing up to a remote VPS takes longer (limited by upload speed). Subsequent incremental backups are fast — Restic and Kopia use deduplication, so only changed blocks are transferred.
Do any of these tools support backing up my phone automatically?
Not directly. For phone photo backup, use Immich or Syncthing to sync photos to your server, then back up the server with Restic or Kopia. There’s no self-hosted equivalent to Backblaze’s mobile app for automatic full-device backup.
Can I still use Backblaze B2 as a storage backend while self-hosting the backup software?
Yes — this is a common hybrid approach. Restic, Kopia, and BorgBackup all support B2 as a storage backend. You get self-hosted encryption (you hold the keys) and flexible retention policies while using B2’s infrastructure. This eliminates the B2 egress fee concern since restores are infrequent.
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