Honest answers about how GWS Backup works.
Yes — free forever. Both the Family and Enterprise editions are free under the GWS Backup Free Licence, for personal and commercial use alike — including MSPs serving paying clients. No trial clocks, no premium tier waiting to ambush you.
Development is funded entirely by voluntary donations. If the software earns its keep, a donation of any size keeps it alive. Free keys show a small supporter reminder inside the app; Supporter Keys ♥ (issued with any donation) don't.
Functionally, nothing — same software, same features, no limits on either. A free key shows an occasional, dismissible supporter reminder inside the admin interface. It never blocks or interrupts a backup, never degrades anything, and never appears in reports or other client-facing output.
A Supporter Key ♥ removes the reminder and adds a supporter badge. You get one by donating any amount — before or after registering — and we'll issue it to the email on your payment. Thank you; it's what keeps the software free for everyone.
No. GWS Backup is free to use, but not open source. Years of evenings and weekends live in this codebase, and keeping the source closed stops others repackaging that work and re-marketing it as their own. You may not rebrand, resell or redistribute the software.
If you'd like it under your own brand legitimately, that's what our white-label programme is for.
Yes — commercially. You can purchase GWS Backup as a white-label product sold under your own identity, or for a one-off fee we'll fit your logo, colours and report templates into the app for you.
Use the contact form with details of your business and we'll come back with a straightforward quote.
No — each free licence key permits one running installation at a time. You can move your installation to a different server whenever you like, but the same key must not be live in two places at once.
Key usage is actively monitored, and keys can be withdrawn if the licence is abused or its conditions aren't followed. If your setup needs something different — failover, clustering, a lab environment — ask us first. We'd much rather work out a solution with you than say no.
The Family Edition is in final development. Register on the homepage and select the Family Edition to join the waitlist — you'll be first in line when it launches, and every release is announced in the changelog.
For the free editions, please allow 1–2 days for a response. For white-label and custom-branded packages, enquiries are usually answered the same day (UK time).
When you backup a workspace for the first time, GWS Backup must perform a complete initial sync of all users, emails, and drive files. Google enforces strict API quotas and limitations on how often we can request information and how much data we can transfer per day.
Because we respect these limits to prevent your Google Workspace from being temporarily locked, the first run can take significantly longer than subsequent differential backups.
This is a feature, not a bug! Many other backup products will silently fail or claim a backup was "successful" even if Google throttled the connection midway through.
If we hit a Google API limit during a backup, we immediately mark the status as "Stopped" and explain the exact error. We believe in total transparency. We will wait for the next scheduled window, and the run will automatically continue exactly where it left off.
You don't need to do anything. GWS Backup uses Differential SQLite Tracing. During the next scheduled run, the engine will instantly recognize what has already been downloaded and will resume fetching the remaining data. Once the entire backup is completely verified, it will be marked as successful.
You can use the Restore Console to recover entire workspaces, specific accounts, or individual files and emails. Simply search for the item using our deep indexing tool and click restore to push it directly back to its original location.
You can set custom retention policies per client. Instead of a hard delete, we offer granular control so you can comply with data protection laws while avoiding accidental wipes. This allows you to phase out old data responsibly.
Download the release ZIP, create a Node.js application in cPanel's Setup Node.js App (Node 22 or newer), upload and extract the files into the application root, and activate your free licence key on first run.
The full step-by-step walkthrough lives on our Install Guide, and a README with the same instructions is included inside the download.
Never inside public_html. The application folder contains your encrypted credentials database and encryption keys — those files must not be web-accessible. Install into a folder in your home directory instead (e.g. ~/gwsbackup).
We also strongly recommend serving it on a subdomain with a random, unguessable name — something like vault-k7x93q.yourdomain.com rather than backup.yourdomain.com. Bots scan predictable subdomain names for login panels around the clock; a random name keeps your installation invisible to them.
Yes. GWS Backup will not run without a licence key — on first run the app asks for your key and stays locked until a valid one is activated. Keys are free — for now they're issued personally, so request yours via the contact form (usually answered within 1–2 days). Automatic key delivery by email is planned for the near future.
Validation requires the server to have outbound internet access, and each key permits one running installation at a time.
A cPanel account with the Setup Node.js App feature, Node.js 22.5 or newer (required for the built-in SQLite engine), PHP with ZipArchive for the update script, and outbound HTTPS access.
The app needs about 100 MB of disk plus roughly 50 MB of RAM per client workspace. Your backup data itself is stored in your destination — Google Drive, S3, Azure or local disk — not on the web server.
Upload the new update.zip and update.php into your existing application folder and run php update.php. The script automatically backs up your database first, extracts the new build, cleans up after itself, and leaves your database, licence and settings untouched. Then restart the app in cPanel.
Every release is announced in the changelog.
No answers match your search.
Try a different word, or send us your question — good ones end up on this page.