How can I backup windows 11 to external drive?

For advanced users, Robocopy is a very powerful and flexible solution for backing up Windows 11 to external drive.

Robocopy (Robust File Copy) is a powerful command-line tool built into Windows, designed for fast, reliable file and folder copying. It’s more advanced than basic copy or xcopy commands, offering features like mirroring. It syncs source and destination (deletes files in destination if removed from source). It is my favorite tool for backing up Windows 11 to external drive.

✅ Best for: Backing up personal files (like File History, but manual).

# Backup user folders (Documents, Pictures, etc.) to external drive
robocopy "C:\Users\YourUsername" "E:\Backup" /MIR /COPYALL /R:1 /W:1 /LOG:"E:\BackupLog.txt"

/MIR = Mirror (deletes files in destination if removed from source).

/COPYALL = Preserves permissions/timestamps.

/R:1 /W:1 = Retries once with a 1-second wait if files are locked.

/LOG: = Saves a log file.

Tip: Replace "C:\Users\YourUsername" with specific folders (e.g., "C:\Data").