NAS vs cloud — how do you back up your data?

[thomaspoli]

Curious how everyone here handles backups in 2026. I've been torn between a local NAS setup and cloud backup for my notebook and Samsung SSDs. NAS gives full control and no monthly fees, but there's the upfront cost and you maintain it yourself. Cloud is hands-off but subscriptions add up. What do you all use — NAS, cloud, external drives, or a mix? Any lessons learned the hard way?

[JAMES4578]

Hi @thomaspoli  Personally I use cloud, external Drives though certainly a NAS could be worthwhile.  I think it is best not to rely on one option.

[Moiramon]

Cloud and external HDD X2. No nas.

[Trollwiththepunches]

..back up... back up? Oh, are we meant to back up? Cos I, er... don't! 🤷

[redsunset2022]

Cloud with auto sync wins for convenience and accessibility on the move. However, if you deleted some files and didn't realise for over a month ago, you may be out of luck.

If you can afford it, cloud coupled with 2/3 external hard disks for a grandfather, father, son backup routine would be great. Your view of how critical your data is should shape your backup regime. Perhaps you could ignore the daily backup (son), if your data doesn't change frequently, or you could tolerate <7 days data loss - your call on that 😊 Ideally keep your external hard disk away from your PC, so if the PC gets stolen, you're less likely to also lose your disks (but will still have the cloud as well).

I'm not going to get in to mirror and RAID disks configurations as they're complex to set up for home use and do little to protect against fire, flood or theft.

[Obsydian]

I dont know anymore, was a HDD, then SSD advocate but shifted to Cloud after a few corrupted device issues but seems Cloud storage is becoming less generous, plus recent example of Samsung dropping Microsoft OneDrive for Google drive, just gives me no certainty 🙏