Rclone Incremental Backup

An Obsidian plugin that backs up a vault incrementally with rclone, built for large vaults (10–100+ GB). It is modelled on Simple Backup — same schedule, progress notice and wake-lock — but the copying is done by rclone sync --backup-dir, as described in docs/rclone-backup-guide.md.

rclone is required. If it is not found, the plugin raises an error and offers to install it (see below).

How it works

<target>/
├── current-full-copy/                      <- always a 1:1, ready-to-open copy of the vault
└── incremental/
    ├── 2026-10-30_14-30-00/      <- previous versions of files changed in that run,
    │   └── Notes/Astronomy.md       and files deleted from the vault
    └── 2026-11-02_09-15-22/

Each run executes rclone sync <vault> <target>/current-full-copy --backup-dir <target>/incremental/<timestamp>. Unchanged files are neither re-read nor rewritten; anything a run overwrites or deletes in current-full-copy/ is moved into that run's timestamped folder instead of being lost. A run that changes nothing creates no folder. rclone runs as a separate process, so Obsidian's UI never freezes and large media is not re-compressed.

Features

• Ribbon icon and commands: Run incremental backup now, Cancel running backup, Check / install rclone.
• Triggers: on startup, hourly, daily at a set time (a failed daily run is retried every 30 minutes, up to 3 times).
• Live progress notice (files and bytes, from rclone's own statistics).
• Keeps the computer awake while a backup runs.
• Exclusion list (matched at any depth), optional "delete incremental folders older than N days" (off by default).
• Refuses a target that is the vault, inside it, or contains it.
• Only errors are logged, to backup-errors.log in the plugin folder.

Installing rclone

The plugin looks for rclone at the configured path, then on PATH, then in the usual install locations (e.g. winget's link folder, /usr/local/bin, Homebrew) and in its own bin/ folder. If none works, a backup stops with an error and the rclone is required dialog offers:

Scheduled (unattended) backups never open the dialog; they show the error notice.

Restoring

• One file: open incremental/<timestamp>/ created right after the change or deletion and copy the file back.
• Whole vault, latest state: open current-full-copy/ as a vault ("Open folder as vault").
• An earlier state: rclone copy "<target>/incremental/<timestamp>" "<vault>" -v, newest folder last. See the guide.

Development

npm install
npm run build   # bundles src/ into main.js
npm test        # includes an end-to-end test that runs real rclone when it is installed

Release with npm run release after bumping the version in manifest.json, package.json and versions.json.

Disclosures

• Runs external programs: it starts rclone (the actual copying) and, only when you click an install button, winget, brew or curl … | pkexec bash.
• File access outside the vault: it reads the vault and writes the backup target folder you choose (and deletes old incremental folders there if you set a retention period). It also writes backup-errors.log and, if you use the download option, bin/rclone inside the plugin's own folder.
• Network: nothing is sent during a backup, and there is no telemetry or account. The only requests are to downloads.rclone.org, and only when you choose "Download into the plugin folder". (Your rclone itself talks to the network only if you point the target at a remote, which this plugin does not set up.)
• Desktop only: it uses Node.js and local executables, so it does not load on mobile.
• Release provenance: release files are built by GitHub Actions from the tagged source and carry build-provenance attestations (gh attestation verify main.js --repo laszlorepassy/obsidian-rclone-incremental-backup).

Support

If this plugin saves your notes one day, you can 🍪 buy me a cookie.

License

MIT