S3, Storage Boxes, or Cheap VPSes: How Proxmox Users Are Really Backing Up in 2026

If you run Proxmox, chances are you've already learned one uncomfortable truth: backups are easy right up until they aren't. On paper, the options look endless. Object storage. Storage boxes. VPSes so cheap they feel like pricing errors. Every provider promises durability, every setup guide says "it just works," and every forum thread eventually turns into a debate about egress fees and deduplication math. But when you strip away the marketing and the docs, a clear pattern emerges in how people actually protect their Proxmox setups in 2026. Most users aren't chasing the perfect backup. They're chasing the one that won't wake them up at 3 a.m. ## The quiet shift away from rsync A few years ago, the default answer to "where should I put my backups?" was simple: rsync them somewhere else and call it a day. That approach still works for basic file copies, but Proxmox backups don't behave like a tidy folder of JPEGs. Modern Proxmox deployments lean heavily on Proxmox Backup Server (PBS), which slices backups into thousands of chunks, deduplicates aggressively, and expects its storage backend to behave in very specific ways. Syncing that datastore with generic tools sounds fine until verification jobs start failing or restores crawl at unusable speeds. That's why the conversation has largely moved on from "how do I sync my backups" to "what backend does PBS actually like." And that's where the real divide begins. ## S3-compatible storage: boring, reliable, and surprisingly popular The biggest winner right now is S3-compatible object storage. Not Amazon's version, necessarily, but the growing ecosystem of providers that speak the same API without charging hyperscaler prices. Services like Backblaze B2 and Wasabi have become go-to choices because they slot neatly into PBS without weird hacks. Once configured, backups run on schedule, deduplication does its thing, and restores behave like restores instead of science experiments. The appeal is simple. You don't manage disks. You don't worry about filesystem corruption. You don't need to remember which VM lives on which mount. Object storage just sits there and accepts data. That said, it's not all smooth sailing. API calls can add up if you're backing up frequently, and verify jobs can feel slower than local storage. Some users have also run into early-version quirks, especially when PBS first added S3 support. Most of those rough edges have been sanded down, but the memory lingers. Still, for people who value predictability over raw speed, S3 has become the default answer. ## Storage boxes: cheap space with a few strings attached Then there's the European favorite: storage boxes. Providers like Hetzner offer massive chunks of storage for prices that look almost suspicious. Five terabytes for the cost of a couple coffees per week is hard to ignore, especially if your backups compress well. These boxes typically expose storage over NFS, CIFS, or sometimes S3-compatible object storage. The flexibility is nice, but it also means you're closer to the metal. You're mounting filesystems across the internet and trusting that latency, packet loss, and occasional hiccups won't matter. For many people, they don't. Nightly backups complete. Restore tests work. Life goes on. But this approach demands a bit more confidence. If a mount drops mid-backup, you need to notice. If performance dips, you need to decide whether that's normal or a warning sign. Storage boxes reward hands-on users who don't mind checking logs now and then. They're not fragile. They just aren't foolproof. ## The "cheap VPS with PBS" crowd One of the more interesting trends is the rise of the ultra-cheap backup VPS. Instead of sending backups to a storage service, some users spin up a small VPS, install Proxmox Backup Server, and replicate their local PBS to it. With aggressive deduplication, dozens of VMs can collapse into surprisingly little space. A few hundred gigabytes suddenly feels generous. This approach scratches a particular itch. You control the entire stack. You know exactly where your data lives. And you're not paying per API call or per gigabyte egress. It also reframes the cost equation. A $20–$30 per year VPS sounds laughably small until you realize your actual backup footprint is under 100GB thanks to deduplication. At that point, object storage can feel like overkill. The downside is responsibility. If that VPS provider disappears, your backups disappear with it. You need to monitor disk health, bandwidth caps, and retention settings yourself. This setup rewards tinkerers who already enjoy managing infrastructure. For everyone else, it's a bit much. ## The unlimited-backup workaround nobody advertises There's also a quieter, more creative solution floating around: backing up to a local machine that's already covered by an "unlimited" consumer backup service. The idea is simple. Export Proxmox backups to an NFS share on a desktop or NAS, and let a third-party backup client handle the cloud copy. From the service's perspective, it's just another folder. From yours, it's a cheap offsite copy. This works. It also lives firmly in the gray area of terms of service and practical limits. Upload speeds can bottleneck hard. Restore workflows are clumsy. And if the provider changes its policy, you're stuck rethinking everything. It's clever, but it's not something most people would call future-proof. ## What people actually care about Across all these setups, the same priorities keep surfacing. First: restores matter more than backups. Everyone can back data up. The real test is how fast and confidently you can pull it back when something breaks. Second: predictability beats raw performance. A slower backup that completes every night is better than a fast one that fails once a week. Third: deduplication changes the math. PBS dramatically reduces storage needs, which is why cheap VPSes and small object storage buckets go further than expected. And finally, convenience wins more arguments than price. People will happily pay a little more to avoid babysitting mounts, watching API counters, or debugging flaky sync jobs. ## So which option wins? There isn't a single winner, but there is a clear pattern. If you want the least amount of stress, S3-compatible storage paired directly with Proxmox Backup Server is where most people land. It's dull, predictable, and easy to explain to your future self. If you want the cheapest large-scale storage and don't mind a little hands-on work, storage boxes make a lot of sense, especially for long-term archives. If you enjoy building systems and trust your provider, a cheap VPS running PBS can be shockingly effective. What's notable is what's falling out of favor: ad-hoc rsync setups, brittle sync chains, and anything that requires too many moving parts to restore under pressure. Backups aren't exciting. They're supposed to disappear into the background. In 2026, Proxmox users seem to agree on one thing: the best backup is the one you don't have to think about until the day you really need it.