This is an archive version of the document. To get the most up-to-date information, see the current version.

Performing Backup

With Veeam Backup for Microsoft Azure, you can protect Azure VM data in the following ways:

  • Create cloud-native snapshots of Azure VMs

A cloud-native snapshot includes point-in-time snapshots of virtual disks attached to the processed Azure VM. Snapshots of virtual disks are taken using native Microsoft Azure capabilities.

  • Create image-level backups of Azure VMs

In addition to cloud-native snapshots, you can protect your Azure VMs with image-level backups. An image-level backup captures the whole image of the processed Azure VM (including OS data, application data and so on) at a specific point in time. The backup is saved as a blob to a storage account in the native Veeam format.

  • Create backups of Azure SQL Databases

You can protect your Azure SQL Databases running on a SQL Server and databases located on SQL Managed Instances. Azure SQL database backup captures the whole image of the database (including tables, constraints, indexes and actual data) at a specific point of time. The backup is saved as a single file to a backup repository in the native Veeam format.

Data protection tasks are scheduled to run automatically with backup policies. To perform a quick backup, you can also take cloud-native snapshots of Azure VMs, and backups of SQL databases manually when needed.