Windows 11 Backup Failed - How to Fix It Completely

Backup is necessary to protect your data

Windows 11 comes along with several backup software, which allows you to backup files or folders, system and other drives on the computer. Backup and Restore (Windows 7) is the only one to create a system image in Windows 11 that includes the operating system, system files and settings, personal data, installed programs etc. Then, you can use it to restore Windows 11 system image to new hard drive when your computer encounter system failure, such as, system crash, disk corruption, malware attack, and more.

Thus, you may make an exact copy of your Windows 11 with this backup software, but sometimes you may find the Windows 11 backup failed with different error code, such as, 0x80070001, 0x81000037, or 0x80070003, 0x807800c5, 0x8100002F, and more. Don't worry too much about it, keep reading below to learn how to fix it.

Windows 11 backup failed - fix it completely

Windows 11 backup failed may due to many reasons, it can be the folders or libraries you are trying to backup or restore include a reparse point (similar to Windows shortcuts or to Unix symbolic links), a conflict of the WindowsImageBackup folder, a corrupted or damaged target disk, the system-level of corruption including system files or Windows image, etc.

No matter what the reason is, you can find a solution in the following. Please stay for a while and check them carefully.

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Method 1: Try system file checker

This method works if the backup failed due corrupted system files. If you are in this situation, check the steps below.

Step 1. Type cmd in the search box and select Run as administrator to open the command prompt.

Step 2. Type sfc /scannow and hit Enter to execute. This process may take 20 minutes for scanning or repairing the corrupted system files, please wait patiently and then restart your computer for these changes to take effect.

Method 2: Restore heath with DISM command line

If the first method does not find any error, the problem may be caused by Windows image instead of system file crruptions. You can still take the help of DISM command line utility with the following steps.

Step 1. Run cmd as administrator.

Step 2. In the Command Prompt window, type the DISM command below and hit Enter. It will detect and fix the problematic Windows image files.

DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth

Step 3. Restart your computer to keep these changes.

Method 3: Check if your disk has bad sectors with chkdsk

If both system file corruptions or defective Windows image are not the cause of your problem, you can check if your disk has bad sectors. Follow the steps below.

Step 1. Open cmd as administrator.

Step 2. Type chkdsk F: /f/r/x and press Enter. Replace the F: with your backup target. 

Step 3. Then, you may be told that the CHKDSK cannot run because the volume is in use by another device, type y to confirm you want to schedule this volume at the next system startup.

Step 4. Restart your computer and it will scan the system drive for bad sectors, disk inspection, etc.

Method 4: Rename WindowsImageBackup folder

If the backup failed error still exists as it was, you can go to the location where you save the backup image, then right-click the WindowsImageBackup folder and select Rename, type .old at the end of WindowsImageBackup. After that, try to backup files or system again.

Method 5: Remove the reparse point

If the reparse point points to a volume with FAT file system, please remove it first and then backup your system with built-in backup utility. Because these files are completely blind to it and will be pointed to other directories instead of the directory you want to backup to.

Step 1. Run cmd as administrator and type dir /al /s in the command prompt window. Then, you will see the junction point and its location.

Step 2. Go to the location of the junction point. Right-click it and select Properties from the context menu, then go to the General tab and check if the folder type is Mounted Volume. If so, please delete this file.

Step 3. Repeat the Step 2 until you delete all the reparse files.

Method 6: Use external hard disk as backup target

The Windows 11 backup failed error may also occur when you create a system image backup on the same drive (it includes the data you are willing to safeguard). In this case, you can choose to backup Windows 11 to external hard drive.

Windows 11 backup failed -replace it directly

If you cannot resolve the Windows backup keep failing error or want a reliable Windows 11 free backup software, you could consider using a third-party software, AOMEI Backupper Standard, for example.

It allows you to backup system, disk, partition and files or folders per your needs instead of backing up files while including system image and other drives or only backup system. And you can restore backups to get the operating system and data back quickly when your computer run into a serious issue. And you will benefit a lot from its useful features in the following.

Schedule backups: You can set backup frequency at daily, weekly, monthly, and more precisely to backup time and intervals.
Off-peak hour backup: You can wake your computer from sleep or hibernate mode with Wake the computer to run scheduled tasks feature and shut down your computer by reconfiguring operation.
Backup Methods: You can backup only changed files or folders using its Incremental Backup, greatly reducing backup time and disk space.
Other useful backup options: You can set normal or high compress level to reduce the backup size, backup only used sectors with Intelligent Sector Backup, enable email notification to get backup result timely, etc.

Then, please download this software to backup your Windows 11. Windows 10/8/7/XP/Vista are supported as well.

Step 1. Launch this reliable backup software, select System Backup under the Backup tab. It will select all the partitions required to start your computer.

Step 2. Click the folder shaped button and select a location to store your backup image. If you plan to backup Windows 11 to external hard drive, please connect it in advance.

Step 3 (optional). Click Options and Schedule Backup to add more backup settings and make this task flexibly. You can select Daily, and then set a specific date and time, run backup at a time every day, or from a time to another, the most is to backup every hour.

★Tips:

If you want to minimize the backup size, high compression level, intelligent sector backups, and incremental or differential backup (supported by the professional version) will do you a big favor. The first feature is to directly compress backup image while the latter two is to backup only used sectors or only changed files.

If you don’t want the backup images occupy too much disk space, except for minimizing the backup size, you can choose to delete old backups with Backup Scheme (supported by the professional version) to free up disk space. And this fundamentally solves the problem of backup disk full.

Step 4. Confirm this operation and click Start Backup to create a system image in Windows 11.

Except for system backup, this software also supports Disk Backup, Partition Backup and File Backup. If you want to create any backup of them, click it under the Backup tab and follow the on-screen instructions.

Also, it’s suggested to create a Windows 11 bootable USB, which allows you to boot computer when it fails. Thus, you can restore system to new hard drive even if it’s unbootable.

If you do not have a USB or CD/DVD, you can choose to create a recovery environment on your current computer. You can then access this software directly in the recovery environment without the device the next time your system boots.

What are you going to do?

You may be frustrated about Windows 11 backup failed error if the built-in free backup software for Windows 11 is not working. Then, what are you going to do?

If you insist on using built-in utility, you can try to fix it. But you may encounter other errors and speed much time to repair it, such as, one of the volumes specified for backup is invalid, Windows backup failed to read from the volume shadow copy, the mounted backup volume is in accessible, etc.

If you cannot fix the backup error, you can only choose to reinstall Windows 11 when your computer stop responding. During the process, you will lose all the installed programs and personal data. To avoid this situation, the best way is to use a third-party reliable backup software for replacement, such as, AOMEI Backkupper Standard.