Automating WordPress Backups with Plesk: Setting Up a Daily Cron Job for each domain

[johannliebert]

Server operating system version

Ubuntu 22.04

Plesk version and microupdate number

18.0.62

Hello everyone,

I need help setting up a cron job on Plesk to automate daily backups of my WordPress site. I found the command used by Plesk's backup manager in the logs, but when I tried to use it in a cron job, I encountered errors related to task IDs not being found.

Here's what I've tried so far:

1. Manually triggering a backup in Plesk and checking the logs for the command used.
2. Setting up a cron job with the found command:
   
   /opt/psa/admin/bin/php /opt/psa/admin/plib/scripts/task-async-executor.php -task-id 1753
   This resulted in an error: Unable to find row with id 1753 in longtasks table.

After some research, I found that using the Plesk CLI directly might be a better approach. However, I’m unsure of the exact command syntax and the best way to set it up.

Can anyone provide guidance on:

1. The correct Plesk CLI command to create a full backup (files and database) of a specific WordPress site?
2. How to set up the cron job in Plesk to run this command daily?

PS: I know there are better ways, but I need a cron job.

Thanks in advance for your help!

 

[Evgeny]

In your screenshots I see backups that created by wp toolkit, not plesk. Anyway, you can use this wp-toolkit CLI command, and you can add it to cron (command can be run under root only)



P.S. you tried to run internal task that already done, it has no sense.

 

[johannliebert]

In your screenshots I see backups that created by wp toolkit, not plesk. Anyway, you can use this wp-toolkit CLI command, and you can add it to cron (command can be run under root only)

View attachment 26627

P.S. you tried to run internal task that already done, it has no sense.

thank you.

Maybe I need to specify:

I need just one command like this for Cron: This is an example for my database and works perfect.

/usr/bin/mysqldump -u Database user name -p'Database Password' Database Name > /var/www/vhosts/example.com/dump_$(date +\%F).sql && zip -j /var/www/vhosts/example.com/dump_$(date +\%F).sql.zip /var/www/vhosts/example.com/dump_$(date +\%F).sql && rm /var/www/vhosts/example.com/dump_$(date +\%F).zip

 

[Kaspar@Plesk]

/sbin/plesk ext wp-toolkit --backup -instance-id 1 -path /httpdocs -operation backup

As @Evgeny already noted, this can only be ran as root user.

You can use the plesk ext wp-toolkit --list command to find the instance-id of a particular WordPress installation.

 

[johannliebert]

/sbin/plesk ext wp-toolkit --backup -instance-id 1 -path /httpdocs -operation backup

As @Evgeny already noted, this can only be ran as root user.

You can use the plesk ext wp-toolkit --list command to fin the instance-id of a particular WordPress installation.

thank you very much @Kaspar@Plesk , it works perfectly. Really nice Job.

Now I Know how it's done.
Closed.