A download or export gives you files for analysis or migration. A restore returns HubSpot to a prior known good state, preserving relationships, assets and settings. This briefing explains why that difference matters to resilience, how it affects your Recovery Point Objective and Recovery Time Objective, and what leaders should mandate to reduce business risk.
A download is a copy for offline use. It does not reinstate operations. A restore is a governed process that returns HubSpot to a chosen timestamp with relationships, assets and settings intact. If you care about resilience, set clear Recovery Point Objective, RPO, and Recovery Time Objective, RTO, and test restores in drills, not downloads.
This briefing is for leaders who set risk posture and need a defensible position. Growth sponsors will see how to cut downtime and present a clear plan to the board. Risk and compliance owners will learn which controls and evidence auditors expect. Procurement leaders will understand how restore capability affects total cost and why policy must reflect it.
A download or export is an extract of data or assets for offline use. A restore returns selected data, assets and settings to a prior known good state at a specific time. RPO is the maximum acceptable data loss between backups. RTO is the maximum acceptable time to restore operations. A point in time restore recovers to a defined timestamp. A targeted restore limits scope to a set of records, an object or a configuration item. These definitions convert general resilience goals into measurable outcomes.
Downloads do not bring back operations, they create files that still need manual re‑imports, mapping and checks. Every manual step slows recovery and increases the risk of duplicates and inconsistencies. Restores use tested runbooks to shorten recovery, preserve relationships and configuration, and create an audit trail of approvals, actions and results. As change velocity rises through AI, imports and integrations, the likelihood of mass change increases. Restore capability becomes essential to meet RPO and RTO consistently.
Ask five questions and insist on written answers.
If a bulk property overwrite hits Contacts and Deals, a download means export, reconcile and manual re‑import, with a high risk of duplicates. A restore reverts the affected objects to a timestamp before the incident and checks associations. If a misconfigured workflow triggers unwanted actions, a download offers limited help and logic must be rebuilt. A restore reverts workflow configuration and relevant records. If a theme or module change breaks layouts, a download has no direct path to reinstate templates and relationships. A restore brings back assets and related settings to a stable point.
Insist on a small set of non‑negotiables.
In 30 days, confirm RPO and RTO targets, map current backup scope and gaps, schedule a targeted restore drill and set approval gates. In 60 days, run the drill, capture timings and evidence, close the most material coverage gaps and formalise runbooks for record‑ and object‑level incidents. In 90 days, add a configuration or cross‑asset scenario, publish an executive summary with results, actions and the next review date, and confirm the next drill is on the calendar.
Create a compact evidence pack that includes policies, approvals, restore logs, timings, validation results and lessons learned. Enforce segregation of duties with role definitions and access controls. Report monthly on RPO compliance and last drill RTO, name owners for gaps and due dates for fixes. Send logs to your governance portal or Security Information and Event Management, SIEM, system so reviewers can retrieve proof quickly.
Lower RPO demands more frequent backups, which increases storage and processing. Wider scope restores increase certainty, they take longer and need larger change windows. Manual processes increase error rates, automating restores reduces inconsistencies and time. Document these trade‑offs so budget and policy choices are explicit and defensible.
Moving from downloads to governed restores reduces downtime during incidents and removes weeks of manual effort in severe cases. It strengthens audit posture with traceable approvals and repeatable drills. It clarifies cost by linking resilience targets to measurable drill timings and incident impact, making investment cases easier to defend at board level.
Downloads create files for analysis and migration. They do not return HubSpot to a working state. Manual re‑imports are slow and error‑prone, which increases downtime and the risk of inconsistent data. A restore is a governed process that returns the system to a known good state with relationships and settings intact.
Use change velocity and business impact. Contacts and Deals change frequently and affect revenue, so they often justify hourly backups. Many CMS items can be protected with daily cadence if you can roll back single pages quickly using revision history or a targeted restore.
Adopt targeted restores for defined scopes, prepare predefined runbooks with acceptance tests, and use role‑based approvals so teams act without delay. Schedule drills in quiet windows and pause automations precisely to reduce side effects.
Quarterly is a reliable baseline. Run an extra drill after major schema, workflow or integration changes. Publish the results, the evidence pack and the next actions so the board can see progress and hold owners to account.
Auditors expect to see policies, scope registers, backup schedules, sample backup and restore logs, drill results that validate RPO and RTO, approvals and access reviews, and statements for storage regions and encryption. Evidence should be indexed, tamper evident and easy to retrieve.