You should regularly back up any active database to guard against data loss and to protect your investment in your database design. Using a backup, you can easily restore an entire database or selected database objects.

If the number of records in your database grows regularly, you can also consider archiving the old data. Archiving is the process by which you periodically move older records from a table in an active database to a table in an archive database. This article does not explain how to archive old data.

If you want to automate creating backups of database files, consider using a product that performs automated backups of a file system, such as file server backup software or a USB external backup device. This article does not discuss ways to automate the creation of Microsoft Office Access backups.

To restore a database, you must already have a backup copy of your database.

A backup is commonly referred to as a "known good copy" of a database file — a copy in which you are confident of its data integrity and design. You should use the Back Up Database command in Microsoft Office Access to make backups, but you can use any known good copy to restore a database. For example, you can restore a database from a copy that is stored on a USB external backup device.

You can restore an entire database, or you can selectively restore objects in a database.

If you do not have a backup copy, you risk data loss and unwanted changes to or corruption of your database design. For this reason, you should make backups on a regular basis.