AOMEI Cyber Backup
3 Effective Ways to Backup VMware VM to External Hard Drive
Backing up VMware VMs to an extenernal hard drive is an crutial way to protect data from data loss and system crash. This post will guide you 3 methods of how to copy VMware to an external storage easily.
By Crystal / Updated on August 1, 2024
Case: Can I move virtual machines to an external hard drive?
I need to back up the virtual machines from my ESXi to an external hard drive and pass it to another ESXi somewhere else in case this one ever goes down. How can I backup VMware virtual machines to an external hard drive?
- Question from communities.vmware.com
If you want to avoid VM data loss due to storage issues or server crashes, and you have the same concerns as in the case above, backup VMware VM to external hard drive is a very good insurance measure.
There are 3 available ways to backup VMware VM to external hard drive:
- Download VM files from the datastore
- Export VM to OVF/OVA template
- Backup VMs using professional third-party software
The first 2 ways are practical when you only need to backup several ESXi VMs, but if you have multiple VMs to backup, the third way can provide more efficiency.
In this article, I will introduce the detailed steps of how to perform these backups.
How to backup VMware ESXi VM to external hard drive
2 native ways can be used to copy VM to external hard drive on ESXi. And one professional VMware Backup solution to centrally protect VMs.
Method 1. Download VM files from datastore: A virtual machine is essentially a set of files. The VM folder is enough to recreate a copy of the original VM. In addition, it has the advantage of retaining all snapshots. To restore you just upload these files and register a new VM on original or another host.
Method 2. Export VM to OVF/OVA template: Open Virtualization Format (OVF) is a file format that supports exchange of virtual appliances across products and platforms. Since OVF files are compressed, you can achieve faster downloads by exporting VM from ESXi.
Method 3. Centralized and automated VMware ESXi solution: Offers an automated and centralized way to backup and restore VMware virtual machines.
Method 1. How to download VM files to external hard drive
1. Access to VMware ESXi web client, and power off the VM you want to backup.
2. Navigate to Storage page and click Datastore browser.
3. Open the VM folder and select the VM files, click Download on toolbar.
4. In the pop-up windows, specify the external hard drive as the download destination, and click Save to download the VM files.
Method 2. How to export VM to OVF and store in external hard drive
1. Access to VMware ESXi web client, navigate to Virtual Machines page and power off the VM you want to backup.
2. Right-click on the VM name and select Export.
3. Click OK to download the .ovf file and .vmdk file.
4. Specify the external hard drive as the destination location, and click Save.
Above 2 native ways to backup VMware VM to external hard drive are available on all ESXi versions. However, they also have disadvantage of backing up only one VM at a time. In addition, they may need additional steps of registering or importing as new VMs when restoring.
Therefore, if you want to back up multiple or all VMs on your host, performing these backups one by one can be really laborious. You may get better help from dedicated backup tools, such like AOMEI Cyber Backup, which I am going to introduce in the next part.
Method 3. Best way to backup multiple/all VMware VMs to external hard drive for free
The above native backup ways are practical when backing up a single VM, but if you want to back up multiple or all VMs on your host, performing these backups one by one can be really laborious.
Therefore, here I will introduce a professional and free backup tool that can backup VMs on the ESXi host in 3 easy steps, namely AOMEI Cyber Backup. With this tool, you can easily backup all VMware ESXi virtual machines to a USB drive, and hard drive, SSD, and other external storage.
Except for this, it also has the following benefits:
✦ Agentless Backup: Add VMware ESXi VMs to a central console for backup and management without installing Agent.
✦ Backup to Internal/External Drive: Backup ESXi VM to any detected external drive, USB drive, or network share directly.
✦ Automated Backup: Set up a backup schedule, AOMEI Cyber Backup will automatically run tasks on a daily, weekly, or monthly.
✦ Centralized and Batch Backup: Centrally add and create backup tasks for all or multiple VMware ESXi virtual machines.
✦ Hot Backup: It allows you to backup VMware virtual machines while running, greatly increasing your productivity.
✦ Email Notification: You can enable the Email Notification features. It will send an Email to notify a successful backup and other backup conditions.
✦ Restore from Any Point: Quickly restore entire VM from any backed-up history version.
AOMEI Cyber Backup supports both paid and free versions of VMware ESXi 6.0 and later versions. Next, I will demonstrate how to backup VMware ESXi VMs using AOMEI Cyber Backup. You can click the button to download the free edition:
*You can choose to install this VM backup software on either Windows or Linux system.
3 simple steps to backup multiple ESXi VMs to external hard drive
Step 1. Bind Device: Access to AOMEI Cyber Backup web client, navigate to Source Device > VMware > + Add VMware Device to add vCenter or Standalone ESXi host as the source device. And then click … > Confirm.
Step 2. Create Backup Task: Navigate to Backup Task > + Create New Task, and set Task Name, Backup Type, Device, Target, Schedule according to your needs.
- Device: using AOMEI Cyber Backup you can backup multiple VMs on the host.
- Target: selecting to back up to an attached external hard drive, or to a network path. Used paths will be saved in Favorite Storage for handy selection.
- Archive: If you want to save backups to a cloud storage. Choose "Archiving backup to Amazon S3" and add a S3 bucket. Once your VMware backup is created, the backup files will be automatically archived to the Amazon S3.
- Schedule: choose to perform full, differential or incremental backup, and automate execution daily, weekly or monthly according to the frequency you specified.
✎While the Free Edition covers most of VM backup needs, you can also upgrade to enjoy more advanced features:
▶ Backup cleanup: specify a retention policy, and the old backup files that exceed the period will be auto-deleted.
▶ Restore to new location: Backup VMware virtual machines and restore to another host or computer.
Step 3. Start Backup: You can select Add the schedule and start backup now, or Add the schedule only.
Summary
When it comes to backup, there is a golden 3-2-1 backup rule: keep 3 copies of data, store backups on 2 types of media, and keep at least 1 backup offsite.
Therefore, you may need to copy VMware ESXi VM to external drive, for example, copy ESXi VM to USB to keep an offsite backup. In this article I introduced 3 available ways to backup VMware VM to external hard drive.
With native backup ways, you can easily backup single or several ESXi VMs. However, if you want to backup multiple VMs on the host, AOMEI Cyber Backup, the professional and free backup tool may help you better.
