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Manage backup locations

Define external S3 targets for application backups. Backups sent to an external location survive even if the cluster itself is lost.

Where​

Sidebar → Organizations → your org → Backup Locations tab. The tab is visible when your role has any of backup-locations:create / update / delete.

Rows carry two badges:

  • Default — backups created without an explicit location go here instead of in-cluster storage
  • Global — defined by the platform admin for every org. You can Test a global location against your own edges, but not edit or delete it.

Add a location​

Add Location opens a drawer:

  • Name — displayed in the Backup Location dropdown (e.g. Central MinIO)
  • S3 Endpoint — leave empty for native AWS S3; otherwise the URL, e.g. https://s3.example.com (MinIO, RGW)
  • Bucket — required
  • Region — e.g. us-east-1
  • Access Key / Secret Key — the secret key is write-only; when editing, leave it empty to keep the current one
  • CA Certificate (PEM) — required when the endpoint uses a certificate signed by a private CA. Like the secret key, the stored value isn't echoed back — empty means "keep"
  • Skip TLS verification — not recommended; prefer providing the CA certificate above
  • Use as default backup target — backups without an explicit location will go here instead of in-cluster storage

Test a location​

Row actions → Test → pick an edge instance → Test.

The location is validated by the selected edge's backup agent (Velero), so what you're really testing is "can that cluster reach this bucket with these credentials". Validation can take up to 90 seconds; the verdict comes back as a badge:

  • Available (green) — the edge can write to the location
  • Unavailable (red) — plus a message; check endpoint, credentials and CA certificate

Testing works on global locations too — useful to confirm a platform-provided target is reachable from your edges before pointing schedules at it.

Edit or delete​

Row actions → Edit / Delete (own locations only; global rows are read-only).

Deleting a location is safe for history: existing backups remain restorable; new backups just can no longer target it.

Using locations in backups​

Once at least one location exists, the backup and schedule dialogs (Applications → release detail → Backups tab) grow a Backup Location dropdown. See How-to: run a Velero backup.

Common errors​

  • BACKUP_LOCATION_UNAVAILABLE — the location is unreachable; check endpoint, credentials and CA certificate
  • BACKUP_LOCATION_NOT_VALIDATED — the test didn't produce a verdict in time; check that Velero is healthy on the edge
  • BACKUP_LOCATION_NOT_FOUND — the location was deleted (or belongs to another org); pick a different one

See also​