Backup & restore Beta

A MetaDock setup is a lot of accumulated work: profiles, logins, sessions, workspaces, layouts, themes, proxies, and settings. You can save all of it to one encrypted file and bring it back on the same PC or a new one, or move a single profile on its own.

Beta

Backup and restore work, but they are still maturing. Keep a second copy of anything you cannot afford to lose before you rely on a restore, and be especially careful with the replace-all mode described below. What “Beta” means.

What are the two kinds of backup?

A whole-installation backup saves everything: every profile, workspace, layout, theme, proxy, alias, and setting, in one encrypted file. A single-profile bundle moves just one profile, with its cookies, logins, extensions, and browsing data intact. Pick by whether you are moving a machine or a profile.

Use this and When you want to
Use this	When you want to
Whole-installation backup	Save or move everything: every profile, workspace, layout, theme, proxy, alias, and setting
Single-profile bundle	Move or copy one profile, with its cookies, logins, extensions, and browsing data

Both produce one encrypted file protected by a password you choose, and both are done entirely on your machine. Nothing is uploaded anywhere.

How do I back up my whole MetaDock installation?

Open Settings → Export/Import and choose to export everything. You pick where the file goes and a password of at least eight characters.

What goes into it:

•Every profile: including its cookies and live sessions, saved logins, extensions, bookmarks, downloads, and browsing history
•Workspaces and layouts: the arrangement of every window and panel
•Global settings: themes, proxies, search engines, aliases, site permissions, keyboard shortcuts, and ad blocking configuration
•Vault contents: included when the vault is unlocked at the time of the export

Note

If the vault is locked when you export, the backup simply contains no vault data. Unlock it first if you want your saved logins to travel with the file.

Browser secrets are re-encrypted as part of the export, which is what lets the backup be restored under a different Windows account or on a different PC and still have working sessions.

Should I restore by merging or replacing?

When you open a backup file, MetaDock first shows you the file's size and fingerprint so you can confirm you picked the right one. Then you choose how to restore it:

Mode and What it does
Mode	What it does
Merge	Keeps everything you have now and adds what is missing from the backup. Nothing existing is deleted.
Replace all	Wipes the current installation and restores the backup in its place.

Merge is the safe default. Profiles and workspaces from the backup that collide with names you already use are brought in under a distinguishing name rather than overwriting yours.

Warning

Replace all is destructive. It removes your current profiles, workspaces, and settings before restoring the backup. Only use it when the data you are replacing is disposable or you have a backup of it too.

Before a replace-all begins, MetaDock takes its own safety copy of the current installation, and if anything goes wrong during the restore it puts things back rather than leaving you with a half-restored install. Close any browser running on a profile you are about to replace: if a profile is still in use, the restore stops cleanly before it changes anything.

A successful replace-all asks you to restart MetaDock so everything reopens from the restored installation.

How do I move one profile to another PC?

If you only want to move one identity, export that profile on its own from the profile manager. You get a single encrypted profile file protected by a password.

•Sessions come with it: cookies and saved logins are re-encrypted so they work on the destination machine and Windows account
•Extensions come with it: the profile's installed extensions are part of the bundle
•Browsing data comes with it: bookmarks, history, autofill, and the profile's own settings
•Name collisions are handled: importing a profile whose name is already taken brings it in under a distinct name

Note

Vault entries travel inside the bundle in their encrypted form. They still need the original vault master password after the import.

What does the backup password protect?

The password you set on a backup or profile file is the only thing protecting it. It is used to derive an encryption key with a deliberately slow function, so guessing at it is expensive, and a wrong password and a damaged file report the same generic error so that nothing can be learned from the difference.

Warning

There is no recovery for a backup password. Lose it and the file is unreadable, by you or anyone else. Store it somewhere you trust.

What else should I know about backups?

Backup and restore are local only and deliberately unavailable over the API, because these files hold live sessions and credentials. Treat an encrypted backup the way you would a password manager export, and expect machine-tied items like API keys to need re-issuing after restoring onto a different PC.

•Local only, by design: backup and restore are not available over the API or to AI assistants, because these files contain live sessions and credentials
•Files in use are skipped, not fatal: if a browser rewrites a file mid-export, that file is skipped and the count is reported instead of failing the whole backup
•Machine-tied items may need re-issuing: API keys and connection grants are bound to the machine that created them; after restoring on a different PC you may need to issue new ones
•Themes have their own export: for sharing just a color scheme, use the theme editor's export instead of a whole backup
•Keep the file safe: an encrypted backup still contains everything; treat it like the password manager export that it partly is

Coming from a different browser rather than another MetaDock install? See Import from another browser.