# After migration, backup takes 4 x more
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305
**Category:** Support
**Tags:** backups
**Created:** [March 14, 2020, 11:26am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305 "2020-03-14T11:26:24Z")
**Posts on this page:** 11
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@eextra](https://meta.discourse.org/u/eextra)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2020, 11:26am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/1 "2020-03-14T11:26:24Z")
I restored the images by hand - I copied them from the old hosting. And everything works but there is a problem with backup now it takes 4x more GB with the same settings.
Any way to clear all unnecessary files ?
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### Author:  [@codinghorror](https://meta.discourse.org/u/codinghorror)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2020, 4:41pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/2 "2020-03-14T16:41:08Z")
Probably due to retina image sizing because multiple copies of the images are needed depending on the resolution of the users device.
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### Author:  [@Stephen](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Stephen)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2020, 6:15pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/3 "2020-03-14T18:15:53Z")
Could we get a backup option that only covers original assets? Understand it would mean a bunch of reprocessing in any restore, but wearing my ops hat for a moment it would really help with local disk space and shipping between systems.
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### Author:  [@eextra](https://meta.discourse.org/u/eextra)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2020, 10:07pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/4 "2020-03-14T22:07:47Z")
> [@codinghorror](#):
>
> Probably due to retina image sizing because multiple copies of the images are needed depending on the resolution of the users device.
Okay, but why does a copy of the same thing just take 4x more after migration?
after all, it’s still exactly the same files and the same content. I don’t understand where that comes from.
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### Author:  [@codinghorror](https://meta.discourse.org/u/codinghorror)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2020, 10:30pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/5 "2020-03-14T22:30:14Z")
It’s mostly a caching thing, otherwise you’d have to re-render the images at smaller sizes on the fly which would be extremely computationally intensive.
You’re right that backups can probably skip this part though @stephen and I know @sam has mentioned this in the past? The only downside is restoring a backup becomes very CPU intensive as the backup must then re-render all the resolutions, but that’s not a serious downside in my book – unless you’re in a hurry, or have a CPU underpowered server perhaps?
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### Author:  [@Stephen](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Stephen)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2020, 10:55pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/6 "2020-03-14T22:55:02Z")
I can’t speak for everyone but I would prefer the option to eat a short term CPU hit regenerating assets over needing to allocate 4x more disk for backups.
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### Author:  [@eextra](https://meta.discourse.org/u/eextra)
#### Post date: [March 16, 2020, 10:15am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/7 "2020-03-16T10:15:21Z")
> [@codinghorror](#):
>
> have to re-render the images at smaller sizes on the fly which would be extremely computationally intensive.
How do you do that ??
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### Author:  [@gerhard](https://meta.discourse.org/u/gerhard)
#### Post date: [March 16, 2020, 10:44am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/8 "2020-03-16T10:44:52Z")
> [@Stephen](#):
>
> Could we get a backup option that only covers original assets?
That’s how backups work. By default, thumbnails aren’t included in backups. We changed that at least a year ago.
You can configure that behavior with the `include_thumbnails_in_backups` site setting.
> Include generated thumbnails in backups. Disabling this will make backups smaller, but requires a rebake of all posts after a restore.
@eextra I’d recommend creating a file based diff of the content of an old and new backup in order to find out why the backup is so much larger.
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### Author:  [@codinghorror](https://meta.discourse.org/u/codinghorror)
#### Post date: [March 17, 2020, 8:56pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/10 "2020-03-17T20:56:39Z")
> [@gerhard](#):
>
> That’s how backups work. By default, thumbnails aren’t included in backups. We changed that at least a year ago.
>
> You can configure that behavior with the `include_thumbnails_in_backups` site setting.
My bad – thanks for the clarification @gerhard 🍻 .. I do think that’s the better default.
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### Author:  [@system](https://meta.discourse.org/u/system)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2024, 9:38am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/11 "2024-03-14T09:38:02Z")
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### Author:  [@JammyDodger](https://meta.discourse.org/u/JammyDodger)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2024, 9:43am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/after-migration-backup-takes-4-x-more/144305/12 "2024-03-14T09:43:05Z")