HeartBeatAgents

Restoring From a Backup Fails

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"Not an administrator," a missing Recovery Kit file, a degraded restore, or "Database unreachable": what each one means.

"That account is not an instance administrator"

Restoring replaces the entire database, so it requires an instance administrator's own credentials specifically, not just any valid account on the instance being restored.

"Both files are needed"

Restoring a backup on different hardware from what made it requires two files together: the .keys file (sitting next to the archive in your bucket) and the Recovery Kit .json file you downloaded when you set up off-site replication. Neither one works alone. If you're restoring on the exact same machine that made the backup, skip this step entirely; you don't need either file.

"Restored with warnings" (a degraded restore)

The restore itself completed, but some configuration files couldn't be reapplied, and the instance is still using its previous encryption keys, so credentials stored before the restore may not decrypt correctly. You can continue to sign in; reconnect any integration that subsequently fails from Settings → Integrations.

"Database unreachable"

The instance can't verify its own state, so restoring over the network is disabled entirely as a safety measure; this isn't a bug to retry past. Recovering from this state requires an operator with direct access to the host, following the disaster-recovery runbook rather than the normal restore screen.

"Restore failed" with no further detail

A generic failure. Because a failed restore aborts before anything is swapped in, your existing system is untouched either way; check that the snapshot file itself wasn't corrupted or partially downloaded before trying again.