% Zoolz Review (Updated for October 2022) GA
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Zoolz Review
A Full Review of Zoolz, an Online Backup Service
By Tim Fisher Tim Fisher Senior Vice President & Group General Manager, Tech & Sustainability Emporia State University Tim Fisher has more than 30 years' of professional technology experience.
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Elijah Patel 1 minutes ago
He's been writing about tech for more than two decades and serves as the VP and General Manager ...
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He's been writing about tech for more than two decades and serves as the VP and General Manager of Lifewire. lifewire's editorial guidelines Updated on October 2, 2022 Tweet Share Email We independently research, test, review, and recommend the best
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If you buy something through our links, we may earn a commission. Tweet Share Email Backup & Utilities File Types Apps Windows MS Office Linux Google Drive Backup & Utilities Design Cryptocurrency Our editors independently research, test, and recommend the best products; you can learn more about our review process here. We may receive commissions on purchases made from our chosen links.
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Sofia Garcia 4 minutes ago
Zoolz offers a cloud backup service that comes with support for unlimited users, external drive back...
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James Smith 4 minutes ago
It lets you upload all types of files and of any size, assuming you don't go over your maximum a...
Zoolz offers a cloud backup service that comes with support for unlimited users, external drive backup, and server backup. There's also policy control, strong data encryption, and 24/7 live support.
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Luna Park Member
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It lets you upload all types of files and of any size, assuming you don't go over your maximum allowed backup space. Several plans are available that offer anywhere from 1 TB up to over 200 TB of space.
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Scarlett Brown 6 minutes ago
There are, however, some limitations that you should understand before you purchase one of these pla...
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Chloe Santos 1 minutes ago
Sign Up for Zoolz Cloud Continue reading our review of Zoolz for all the details on the plans they ...
There are, however, some limitations that you should understand before you purchase one of these plans. More on those below.
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Daniel Kumar Member
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Sign Up for Zoolz Cloud Continue reading our review of Zoolz for all the details on the plans they sell, a pretty extensive list of the features they offer, and some comments we have about the service after trying them out. Zoolz The consumer plan Zoolz Home was discontinued in 2020. Our list of the best cloud backup services has alternatives for home users, like SugarSync and Carbonite.
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Dylan Patel 21 minutes ago
Zoolz Cloud Plans & Costs
Valid October 2022 These plans are paid for on a yearly bas...
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Zoe Mueller 7 minutes ago
Each Zoolz Cloud plan, regardless of the length you choose, provides backup for unlimited external d...
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Jack Thompson Member
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Zoolz Cloud Plans & Costs
Valid October 2022 These plans are paid for on a yearly basis. 1 TB: $139.99 /year2 TB: $279.99 /year5 TB: $699.99 /year10 TB: $1399.99 /year20 TB: $2519.99 /year50 TB: $6299.99 /year To get more than 50 TB of space, you can contact Zoolz for all the details.
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Brandon Kumar Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
Each Zoolz Cloud plan, regardless of the length you choose, provides backup for unlimited external drives and servers, supports unlimited users, and has file versioning. There's a 14-day free trial when you sign up. See our list of Free Online Backup Plans for some truly free online backup options.
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Ava White Moderator
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Sign Up for Zoolz Cloud
Zoolz Features
A backup service should be amazing at their core job: to always make it a priority that your files are being backed up as often as possible. Fortunately, Zoolz automatically monitors your files for changes and can start backups as often as every 5 minutes without any intervention on your part.
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Evelyn Zhang 34 minutes ago
Below are a number of features found in most other backup services along with more on how well, or n...
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Charlotte Lee Member
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Below are a number of features found in most other backup services along with more on how well, or not well, they're supported in one of the Zoolz plans: Zoolz Features Feature
Zoolz Support File Size Limits
No File Type Restrictions
Yes, but you're able to lift the restrictions Fair Use Limits
No Bandwidth Throttling
No Operating System Support
Windows 11/10/8/7, macOS 10.11 or later Real 64-bit Software
No Mobile Apps
No File Access
Desktop software, mobile apps, and web app Transfer Encryption
256-bit AES Storage Encryption
256-bit AES Private Encryption Key
Yes, optional File Versioning
Yes, limited to 10 versions per file Mirror Image Backup
No Backup Levels
Drive, folder, and file Backup from Mapped Drive
Yes Backup from External Drive
Yes Continuous Backup (≤ 1 min)
No Backup Frequency
Customized Idle Backup Option
No Bandwidth Control
Yes Offline Backup Option(s)
Yes, via Zoolz Hybrid+ Offline Restore Option(s)
No Local Backup Option(s)
Yes Locked/Open File Support
Yes, but only for file types you explicitly define Backup Set Option(s)
Yes Integrated Player/Viewer
Viewer only File Sharing
Only with Instant Storage/Vaults Multi-Device Syncing
No Backup Status Alerts
Yes Data Center Locations
US, UK, Australia, Japan Inactive Account Retention
Data will remain so long as the plan is being paid for Support Options
Email, self help, phone, and remote access
Our Experience With Zoolz
Zoolz definitely doesn't have the cheapest backup plans out there, but there are plenty of things that set it apart from other backup services in terms of features... which is sometimes a good thing, but not always. What We Like: All of the Zoolz plans use Cold Storage to store your files, which is in opposition to Instant Storage (which is available through Zoolz Business only).
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Andrew Wilson 4 minutes ago
Files stored this way are designed to be kept forever, which means even if you delete a file from yo...
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Evelyn Zhang 9 minutes ago
Hybrid+ is a feature you can enable in the desktop program that will back up your files to a hard dr...
Files stored this way are designed to be kept forever, which means even if you delete a file from your computer, it will not be removed from your backups unless you explicitly trash them from the web app. However, Cold Storage has some drawbacks (see below) when compared to Instant Storage. See this comparison table on the Zoolz site for more that.
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Oliver Taylor 11 minutes ago
Hybrid+ is a feature you can enable in the desktop program that will back up your files to a hard dr...
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Noah Davis Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
Hybrid+ is a feature you can enable in the desktop program that will back up your files to a hard drive on your computer in addition to your online account. The process happens automatically and you have complete control over the file types that are backed up locally, where the files are stored, and how much disk space Hybrid+ is allowed to use.
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Evelyn Zhang 23 minutes ago
One reason to use Hybrid+ is if you're wanting to restore a file but don't have an Inter...
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Ella Rodriguez 9 minutes ago
Backing up your files is really easy with Zoolz because you have two ways to pick them. You can choo...
One reason to use Hybrid+ is if you're wanting to restore a file but don't have an Internet connection. If your Hybrid+ location is accessible, and the files you want to restore are located there, you don't even have to have an Internet connection to get your files back. The Hybrid+ files can be stored on the local drive, an external one, or even over your local network.
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Noah Davis 27 minutes ago
Backing up your files is really easy with Zoolz because you have two ways to pick them. You can choo...
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Noah Davis 8 minutes ago
Context menu options can be enabled so you can also back up your files from the Windows Explorer rig...
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Liam Wilson Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
Backing up your files is really easy with Zoolz because you have two ways to pick them. You can choose a category, like Bookmarks or Videos, to have all of those types of files backed up, as well as select the exact hard drives, folders, and files that you want included, giving you precise control over what you upload.
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Lucas Martinez Moderator
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
Context menu options can be enabled so you can also back up your files from the Windows Explorer right-click menu. We were able to back up files to Zoolz using both of these methods and at no time did we experience any problems, neither with our overall computer performance nor with bandwidth usage.
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Sofia Garcia 14 minutes ago
Your results will likely vary depending on your particular internet connection and system resources....
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Chloe Santos 25 minutes ago
However, the more you add, the cheaper the additional storage is, per gigabyte (e.g., 100 GB extra i...
Your results will likely vary depending on your particular internet connection and system resources. See our Online Backup FAQ for some more on this. Here are some other notes we took when using Zoolz that you might find helpful: There are tons of tutorials and FAQ at Zoolz Wiki that is freely available to go through
Your files can be restored from both the desktop software and the web app
There's no limit on the size of files you can restore when using the desktop client
Files restored with the desktop program can be automatically restored to the same folder where they originally existed, or you can choose a custom location
Multiple file restores made through the web app are downloaded in a single ZIP file
Some folders are automatically excluded from backups, but you can override this by removing the exclusions
Zoolz lets you build filters that will skip over backing up files of your choice, like files that have a certain extension or name, files that are larger than the size you define, and files that are older than the date you specify
Bandwidth options let you limit the upload speed and optionally only throttle the bandwidth during a certain time frame
Editing and creating new files will be reproduced in your account when the next backup is launched, but renaming and deleting files will be detected automatically and be reflected in your account nearly instantaneously
The thumbnails for JPG and RAW image files can be viewed in the web app even though you can't immediately download the full files out of Cold Storage
"Presentation Mode" is an option you can enable to automatically have all backups paused while you're playing games and watching movies
Bandwidth is conserved with support for de-duplication, which means duplicate files won't be uploaded; Zoolz will instead copy the existing file from your account to make the duplicate instead of uploading it again from your computer
Zoolz can use the Volume Shadow Copy service to back up open and locked files, but only for the file types you tell it to monitor
Deleted files are red in the web app and clear in the desktop app so it's easy to tell which ones no longer exist on your computer
Multithreading can be enabled in Zoolz's settings to speed up backups; enabling this allows a larger number of files to be uploaded at once
A list of "Block Level Extensions" can be built so Zoolz will break up those types of files into small blocks, and then upload only the blocks that were changed instead of backing up the whole file, which uses unnecessary bandwidth
Instant Vault storage can be added to any plan for around $15 for each 20 GB.
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Mia Anderson 4 minutes ago
However, the more you add, the cheaper the additional storage is, per gigabyte (e.g., 100 GB extra i...
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Evelyn Zhang Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
However, the more you add, the cheaper the additional storage is, per gigabyte (e.g., 100 GB extra is around $50) What We Don't Like: By far, the biggest drawback with Zoolz is that files backed up using Cold Storage take 3-12 hours to restore. On top of that, if using the web app, you can only restore 1 GB of your data within a 24 hour period.
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Sebastian Silva Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
This makes restoring all your files out of Cold Storage take a really long time—much longer than any other backup service we've used. When restoring files from Cold Storage using the web app, you'll get an email with the download link. Restoring from the desktop app starts automatically.
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Dylan Patel 11 minutes ago
Something else that bothers me about this is that if you're using the desktop app to restore you...
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Charlotte Lee Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
Something else that bothers me about this is that if you're using the desktop app to restore your files, given that the process takes 3 hours at minimum, you can't choose to restore anything else during that time because the Zoolz Restore utility is busy waiting on the other files to restore. One workaround for this, however, is to use the web app to restore additional files while waiting on the others to finish processing. In addition to the above, you can't restore one file from one folder and another file from a different folder both at the same time.
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Andrew Wilson 38 minutes ago
Zoolz will not let you restore anything but the files contained within one folder or the folders con...
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Ryan Garcia 37 minutes ago
Because of this, it's recommended you use the Hybrid+ feature if you think you'll be res...
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Brandon Kumar Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
Zoolz will not let you restore anything but the files contained within one folder or the folders contained within one drive. As you can imagine, it could take a very long time to restore your files with Zoolz.
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Joseph Kim 63 minutes ago
Because of this, it's recommended you use the Hybrid+ feature if you think you'll be res...
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Noah Davis 29 minutes ago
Some backup services will let you make an unlimited number of changes to your files and have all of ...
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Scarlett Brown Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
Because of this, it's recommended you use the Hybrid+ feature if you think you'll be restoring files often and if you have the available storage for it. Using Hybrid+ will completely bypass the wait time of the Cold Storage restore because Zoolz will check that folder for the file first before attempting to access it from Cold Storage.
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Liam Wilson Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
Some backup services will let you make an unlimited number of changes to your files and have all of those versions of the files backed up and stored on your account. This is a great idea because you can rest assured that any change you make to your data isn't a permanent change - they can always be undone by restoring an older version.
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Harper Kim 41 minutes ago
With Zoolz, however, only 10 of these file versions are stored. This means once you've made the ...
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James Smith 33 minutes ago
Something else to realize about these plans offered by Zoolz is that they are relatively expensive w...
With Zoolz, however, only 10 of these file versions are stored. This means once you've made the 11th change to a file, the very first iteration of it is destroyed from your account and unavailable for restore.
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Kevin Wang 33 minutes ago
Something else to realize about these plans offered by Zoolz is that they are relatively expensive w...
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Luna Park 14 minutes ago
Zoolz Small Print
Rules and restrictions imposed by Zoolz that aren't easily accessible o...
Something else to realize about these plans offered by Zoolz is that they are relatively expensive when you compare them to the prices offered by similar backup services. For example, Backblaze lets you store an unlimited amount of files and will keep file versions for everything for 30 days (Zoolz keeps 10 per file), and costs substantially less than the higher storage plans Zoolz offers. That said, lots of backup services let you pay by the month, but this one only has yearly options.
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Dylan Patel Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
Zoolz Small Print
Rules and restrictions imposed by Zoolz that aren't easily accessible on the website, but are still very much enforced, can be found tucked away in Zoolz's Terms. Here are several things you should be aware of before creating an account: Zoolz has the right to modify, suspend, or discontinue its services without providing you with any notice (though they will use reasonable efforts to do so)
If you avoid renewing your paid account, if your account expires, or if it's terminated, Zoolz reserves the right to automatically delete all your backed up data
If you cancel your Zoolz account, your personal data may be kept in their backup records
Credit card information is the only personal data that's disclosed to third parties and that's done only to process your payments
Your IP address may be recorded when backing up data
Zoolz doesn't view any data that you back up, but they will disclose your information in compliance with a government request
You agree that you won't use Zoolz to transmit any malicious or harmful computer code
Zoolz will terminate any account that uploads or stores files that are infringing on copyrights held by third parties
Final Thoughts on Zoolz
Frankly, and probably already obviously, Zoolz isn't our favorite service.
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Sofia Garcia Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
Other services offer better prices, even for unlimited backup plans. That said, maybe there's a feature or two that really speaks to your situation.
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Sebastian Silva Member
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
In that case, Zoolz might be the best fit for you. Sign Up for Zoolz Cloud Was this page helpful? Thanks for letting us know!
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Lily Watson Moderator
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Thursday, 01 May 2025
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