Full system backup with rsync in linux

This command depends on brace expansion available in both the bash and zsh shells. When using a different shell, --exclude patterns should be repeated manually.

# rsync -aAXv --exclude={"/dev/*","/proc/*","/sys/*","/tmp/*","/run/*","/mnt/*","/media/*","/lost+found"} /* /path/to/backup/folder

Using the -aAX set of options, the files are transferred in archive mode, ensuring that symbolic links, devices, permissions and ownerships, modification times, ACLs and extended attributes are preserved.

The --exclude option will cause files that match the given patterns to be excluded. The contents of /dev, /proc, /sys, /tmp and /run were excluded because they are populated at boot (while the folders themselves are not created), /lost+found is filesystem-specific. Quoting the exclude patterns will avoid expansion by shell, which is necessary e.g. when backing up over SSH.

Note:

• If you plan on backing up your system somewhere other than /mnt or /media, do not forget to add it to the list of exclude patterns to avoid an infinite loop.
• If there are any bind mounts in the system, they should be excluded as well, so that the bind mounted contents is copied only once.
• If you use a swap file, make sure to exclude it as well.
• Consider also if you want to backup the /home/ folder. If it contains your data, it might be considerably larger than the system. Otherwise consider excluding unimportant subdirectories such as /home/*/.thumbnails/*, /home/*/.cache/mozilla/*, /home/*/.cache/chromium/*, /home/*/.local/share/Trash/*, depending on software installed on the system. If GVFS is installed, /home/*/.gvfs must be excluded to prevent rsync errors.