Back up and restore

Voyalier keeps everything on your device. That is the point — but it means a lost or wiped computer is lost trips, and the optional vault passphrase has no recovery. A backup is the way out of both.

Find it under Settings → Back up & restore in the desktop app.

The browser-from-source route still stores its workspace in local SQLite, but it does not have the desktop file picker or portable encrypted-backup bridge. Its Settings panel says which pieces are unavailable instead of claiming there is no local database. Use the desktop app when you need to create or restore a .vbk file.

Saving a backup

You choose a backup passphrase, and Voyalier writes a single .vbk file wherever you point it.

The whole file is encrypted with a key derived from that passphrase (Argon2id, then XChaCha20-Poly1305). Everything is inside the sealed part — not just the fields that are already encrypted at rest, but the ordinary ones too, so trip names, destinations, and dates are not readable in the file either.

The backup also carries your workspace’s encryption key, re-wrapped under your backup passphrase. That is what lets the file open on a different computer: without it the restored data would be undecryptable, because the original key lives in the first machine’s keychain. The backup carries it only inside the encrypted container.

When replacing an existing backup, Voyalier writes and synchronizes a complete temporary file before replacing the destination. A failure before replacement preserves the previous file. If replacement succeeds but its durability cannot be confirmed, the error says so: verify the saved backup before deleting another copy. Cancelling the file picker leaves the destination untouched.

There is no recovery if you lose the backup passphrase

Voyalier never stores it and cannot reset it. A .vbk file without its passphrase is unreadable — by us, and by anyone who finds the file.

What a backup does not include

• Downloaded offline maps. They are large, and you can download them again.
• Your AI provider keys. These stay in your computer’s keychain rather than travelling in a file. Re-enter them after restoring.

Everything else comes along: trips, confirmed facts, imported documents, pending suggestions, offline packs, saved advice and weather snapshots, and your notes.

Restoring a backup

Restoring replaces everything currently in Voyalier with the contents of the backup. It does not merge the two.

It happens in three explicit steps, on purpose:

1. You pick the file and enter its passphrase. Voyalier checks the container and shows its metadata without changing anything.
2. You review that preview and enter the passphrase again to confirm. Voyalier stages the restore. Nothing has changed yet — your current data is untouched, so a change of mind costs nothing; you can cancel the inspection or the pending restore.
3. You quit and reopen Voyalier. The swap happens at startup, before the database is opened, which is why the restart is needed.

The restore keeps a safety copy of your previous workspace in its backups folder as a pre-restore-… file. Voyalier retains matching credentials separately so replacing the live key does not strand an otherwise readable copy. Recovery still depends on a surviving matching credential or the copy’s original vault passphrase; it cannot recreate a lost key.

Interrupted cancellation and rollback resume at startup. An unfinished operation is not evidence that the replacement completed. Keep the workspace and recovery files intact if startup reports a recovery error.

Local safety copies

Pre-update, pre-restore and pre-format copies are local safety nets, rather than portable encrypted backups. Voyalier normally keeps the most recent five. If rotation would discard a copy whose recovery credential is unavailable, it refuses and preserves that evidence. Clear backups explicitly removes owned, validated copies and retires their credentials after the last reference is gone.

Setting a vault passphrase protects retained matching data keys as well as the live key. An older protected copy continues to require its original passphrase, even after you change or remove today’s passphrase. Historical file bytes stay unchanged: plaintext already in an old safety copy is not retroactively encrypted. Use a .vbk export for a complete, portable encrypted backup.

The maintenance recovery command diagnoses an exact local safety copy before explicitly staging it. See Troubleshooting for the source-run instructions.

After a restore

Your workspace opens unlocked, using the key that came with the backup. If the machine you backed up from had a vault passphrase, that is not carried over — set a new one under Encryption if you want it.

Restores that are refused

• A backup from a newer version of Voyalier. Its data may use a shape this build does not understand, so it is refused rather than half-read. Update the app, then restore.
• A wrong passphrase, or a damaged file. Both look the same to Voyalier: the file simply does not open. Nothing is staged.

An older backup is fine — it is migrated forward on the first launch after the swap, the same way an older workspace is.

Where the files live

The .vbk file goes wherever you saved it. Treat it as sensitive: it is encrypted, but it is a complete copy of your trips.

For where Voyalier’s own data and its backups folder live on each platform, see Troubleshooting.