Logical backups and restores

Logical backup is the copying of the actual database data. A pbm-agent connects to the database, retrieves the data, and writes it to the remote backup storage.

Logical restore is the reverse process: The pbm-agent retrieves the backup data from the storage and inserts it on every primary node in the cluster. The remaining nodes receive the data during the replication process.

Warning

Sharded time series collections are not supported.

The following diagram shows the restore flow.

Advantages	Disadvantages
- Easy to operate with, using a single command - Support for point-in-time recovery - The backup size is smaller as it includes only the data	- Much slower than physical backup / restore - Adds database overhead on reading and inserting the data

Make a backup Restore a backup

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Last update: July 16, 2025
Created: July 16, 2025