How to Manually Create a File History Backup in Windows 10
File History was first introduced in Windows 8, and has been improved in Windows 10.
You can use File History to automatically back up versions of your files on a schedule to a location you select to save to. You can select to save backups to an internal hard drive, externally connected drive (ex: USB drive), or you can save to a drive on a network. You can add, remove, and exclude folders to be backed up by File History.
The default folders in your "C:\Users\(user name)" profile folder are added by default to be backed up by File History.
Over time, you'll have a complete history of your files. If the originals are lost, damaged, or deleted, you can restore them. You can also browse and restore different versions of your files.
When you turn on File History, you can also manually create a backup of your files on demand.
This tutorial will show you how to manually create a back up of your files and folders on demand with File History in Windows 10.
File History adds 26 characters to each file name as it backs up. The maximum total full path length of any file that it backs up is 210 characters, including these 26 characters. Thus any original file with a full path length of 185 or more characters is ignored and will not be included in the back up.
Contents
- Option One: To Manually Create File History Backup in Settings
- Option Two: To Manually Create File History Backup in Control Panel
1 Open Settings, and click/tap on the Update & security icon.
2 Click/tap on Backup on the left side, and click/tap on the More options on the right side. (see screenshot below)
3 Click/tap on the Back up now button. (see screenshot below)
4 File History will now create a new backup version of your files from your added folders. (see screenshot below)
5 When finished, you can close Settings if you like.
1 Open the Control Panel (icons view), and click/tap on the File History icon.
2 Click/tap on the Run link under your selected drive. (see screenshot below)
3 File History will now create a new backup version of your files from your added folders. (see screenshot below)
4 When finished, you can close the File History control panel if you like.
That's it,
Shawn
Related Tutorials
- How to Reset File History to Default in Windows 10
- How to Turn On or Off File History in Windows 10
- How to Select a File History Drive in Windows 10
- How to Exclude Folders from File History in Windows 10
- How to Add or Remove Folders to be Backed Up by File History in Windows 10
- How to Change how Often to Save File History in Windows 10
- How to Change how Long to Keep File History in Windows 10
- How to Restore Files or Folders using File History in Windows 10
- How to Delete Older Versions of File History in Windows 10
- How to Recommend File History Drive to Homegroup in Windows 10
- How to Add or Remove a Windows Backup and Restore context menu in Windows 10
- How to Add History to Context Menu in Windows 10
- How to Create File History shortcut in Windows 10