Déjà Dup — The Complete Guide: Simple, Encrypted Personal Backup on Linux

Déjà Dup is the backup tool of the GNOME desktop on Linux. You choose which folders to back up and where, and it takes care of the rest: it backs up regularly, compressing and encrypting before saving. It is open source under GPL-3.0 or later and free for any use.

Déjà Dup

GNOME (Michael Terry)

Simple, encrypted, scheduled personal backup on the GNOME desktop, to a disk, a network server or Google Drive.

Get it from the vendor

What you get

Setup in minutes — folders to include, folders to exclude and a destination.
Regular backups — runs in the background at the interval you choose.
Encryption and compression — data is protected with a password before it is stored.
Destinations — a local or external disk, a network server or Google Drive.
Restore by date — pick a point in time and restore files and folders.

Who it suits

An engineer or student on Linux who wants the home folder backed up without complicated settings. Limitations: Linux only, and it is meant for personal files rather than full system recovery — for that, pair it with a snapshot tool such as Timeshift. If you turn on encryption, write the password down somewhere safe away from the computer.

Related tools

For encrypted command-line backup, cloud included — restic. For operating-system snapshots — Timeshift. For deduplicated backup with a graphical interface — Vorta.