Backup Retention Planner
Add each workload, its criticality, and any compliance/recovery-depth requirements to generate a real daily/weekly/monthly/yearly retention schedule. Calculated in your browser, no account required.
Free to use · no account required
Backup Retention Planner
Everything below is calculated instantly in your browser as you add workloads — nothing is submitted or stored.
IT KORR
Backup Retention Planner
Calculated entirely in your browser — no data submitted.
Microsoft 365 — Critical
Daily
30 days
Weekly
12 weeks
Monthly
36 months
Yearly / Archive
7 years
- •Maintain at least one immutable or offline/air-gapped copy — critical and compliance-driven data is a common ransomware target.
- •Longer retention increases storage consumption — review growth against your storage capacity plan periodically.
Databases — Critical
Daily
30 days
Weekly
12 weeks
Monthly
36 months
Yearly / Archive
7 years
- •Maintain at least one immutable or offline/air-gapped copy — critical and compliance-driven data is a common ransomware target.
- •Longer retention increases storage consumption — review growth against your storage capacity plan periodically.
File Servers — Important
Daily
14 days
Weekly
8 weeks
Monthly
24 months
Yearly / Archive
3 years
- •Longer retention increases storage consumption — review growth against your storage capacity plan periodically.
Virtual Machines — Standard
Daily
7 days
Weekly
4 weeks
Monthly
12 months
Yearly / Archive
1 years
- •Longer retention increases storage consumption — review growth against your storage capacity plan periodically.
This schedule is a planning starting point derived from workload criticality and the compliance/recovery-depth inputs above — it does not automatically satisfy HIPAA, PCI DSS, CMMC, or any other specific framework's retention requirements. Validate final retention periods against the exact regulatory text that applies to your organization.
What The Inputs Mean
What Shapes Your Generated Schedule
Area
What the tool evaluates
Criticality Tier
Critical, Important, or Standard sets the baseline daily/weekly/monthly/yearly defaults for each workload.
Compliance Retention (Years)
A regulatory or contractual minimum retention period, if any — the schedule extends the yearly/archive figure to meet it.
Short-Term Recovery Depth (Days)
How far back you might realistically need to restore from for operational reasons, such as slow-discovered errors — the schedule extends the daily figure to meet it.
Criticality Tier
Critical, Important, or Standard sets the baseline daily/weekly/monthly/yearly defaults for each workload.
Compliance Retention (Years)
A regulatory or contractual minimum retention period, if any — the schedule extends the yearly/archive figure to meet it.
Short-Term Recovery Depth (Days)
How far back you might realistically need to restore from for operational reasons, such as slow-discovered errors — the schedule extends the daily figure to meet it.
Understanding Your Results
A Real Calculated Schedule, Not a Universal Rule
The daily/weekly/monthly/yearly figures shown are computed per workload from the criticality tier and any compliance or recovery-depth inputs you provided — not a single generic answer. It does not automatically satisfy any specific regulatory framework's exact retention text; validate the final figures against your organization's actual compliance requirements before configuring your backup system.
FAQ
Common Questions
How long should regulated data like HIPAA records be retained in backups?
Retention requirements vary by regulation and data type — HIPAA and many financial recordkeeping rules commonly require retention periods in the range of 6-7 years, though the specific requirement depends on your industry and jurisdiction. This planner helps identify whether a specific requirement applies and points you toward setting backup retention to meet it.
Why would I need to restore from an older backup rather than the most recent one?
Many incidents — ransomware, slow-discovered corruption, an error that went unnoticed for weeks — are not caught until well after they occur. If your retention window is too short, the only backups still available may already contain the same problem, making an older, unaffected backup essential to a clean recovery.
Does this tool generate an exact retention schedule for me?
Yes, for each workload you add. It calculates a daily/weekly/monthly/yearly retention schedule from that workload's criticality tier, plus any compliance retention years or short-term recovery depth you specify, using deterministic rules — not a single generic answer for every data type. Use the generated numbers as a starting configuration, then apply them in your actual backup system.
Is anything I enter here saved or transmitted?
No. Every input is processed entirely in your browser to generate the schedule shown on this page. Nothing is stored or transmitted.
Related Guidance
The full guide behind this tool.
Check your current backup posture against the retention guidance this tool provides.
Plan the underlying backup strategy this retention guidance assumes.
Calculate the recovery point objective this retention schedule should support.
Get hands-on help implementing the retention approach this tool recommends.
Operational Support
Need help implementing the right retention schedule?
IT KORR can help you design a compliant, cost-effective retention schedule and validate it with tested restores.
No commitment required — we respond within one business day.