You can create a backup manually, on-demand. This is useful during “lift-and-shift” migrations or prior to upgrades.

Prerequisite

Before you perform a backup you must put Domino into maintenance mode. See the domino-maintenance-mode readme.

Manually generate a backup:

Run the following command to edit the domino-data-importer statefulset:
```
kubectl -n domino-platform edit sts domino-data-importer
```
Set the replicas to 1.
When the domino-data-importer pod is up, run the following code to exec into it:
```
kubectl -n domino-platform exec -it domino-data-importer-0 /bin/bash
```
This command can take a long time, depending on the size of your backup. To prevent a timeout interrupting the command, Domino recommends using a terminal multiplexer tool like /app/tmux so that if your session is disconnected, the command continues running in the background and you can return to the session when you reconnect. For instructions about how to use tmux, see their website or man page man tmux.
In the domino-data-importer pod, run the backup command:
```
importer -c /app/config-4x-example.yaml -b --backup-archive --backup-upload --backup-delete
```
Remove the --backup-delete flag if you want the backup bundle to remain on the local filesystem.

Find the backup bundle in the backup location when it is generated automatically.

Run a Manual, On-Demand Backup