If you just want the easiest option, I’d say Time Machine without even thinking twice. For most people, it’s still the best Mac backup software (if you can call it that)  before doing something like a reset.

Just grab an external drive and use it as your Mac backup drive. Time Machine will create a complete Mac backup, not just your documents, but also your apps, settings, accounts, and pretty much everything else - basically a full system backup and it’s really easy to set up (plug in the drive, open System Settings > General > Time Machine, click Add Backup Disk, select your drive, and you’re done). It takes maybe 30 seconds to configure, and after that Time Machine handles the backups automatically in the background. The nice thing is that if the reset goes well, you can simply restore Mac from Time Machine and continue where you left off. I’ve done that a couple of times over the years, and it worked exactly as expected.

P.S. If you’ve never used it before, I’d suggest following a guide instead of figuring it out as you go. Here’s a good step-by-step guide on how to back up a Mac to an external hard drive with Time Machine. And if you’re more of a visual learner, there are plenty of YouTube walkthroughs that show the whole process from start to finish.

If you really want to know how to backup Mac before reinstalling macOS, I don’t think you’ll find anything better than Time Machine backups. The biggest advantage is that it’s Apple’s own solution, so during macOS Recovery it’s already one of the built-in restore options. You don’t have to mess around with third-party software or manually copy files back afterward. Another bonus is that the backup won’t become useless after this, and if you ever buy another Mac, you can use the same Mac backup disk to migrate to the new Mac.

Stick with Time Machine unless you have some very specific reason not to 🙂

I went a different route. I already had iCloud sync enabled for pretty much everything Apple supports, so there wasn’t much left to worry about. The few folders that weren’t syncing, I uploaded to Google Drive before resetting my Mac and downloaded them again afterward. It worked fine for me, although I probably wouldn’t call it a full system backup like Time Machine. It’s more of a quick workaround if most of your files are already in the cloud.

Quote from JohnMiller on July 19, 2026, 4:12 pm

I went a different route. I already had iCloud sync enabled for pretty much everything Apple supports, so there wasn’t much left to worry about. The few folders that weren’t syncing, I uploaded to Google Drive before resetting my Mac and downloaded them again afterward. It worked fine for me, although I probably wouldn’t call it a full system backup like Time Machine. It’s more of a quick workaround if most of your files are already in the cloud

I wouldn’t rely on that. For iPhones, iCloud backup is a great solution because it creates an actual device backup that you can restore later or use to recover deleted files but on a Mac, though, iCloud is mostly there to keep your files available across devices. That’s a nice bonus, but it’s not the same thing as having a backup of the entire Mac that you can use to restore the system after something goes wrong.

@rarabl if you’re serious about protecting your Mac, I’d look at Time Machine or dedicated Mac backup software instead. There was a pretty good Reddit discussion comparing the different options, check it out when you have some time.

I think there’s a bit of confusion here because people often use the words “sync” and “backup” interchangeably, but they’re not the same thing.

Cloud services are great, but you need to understand what they’re actually doing. Apple has a good guide explaining exactly how iCloud /iCloud Drive works and what gets synced, so I’d recommend reading these first if you’re planning to rely on it:

• https://support.apple.com/guide/icloud/set-up-icloud-on-your-devices-mmfc0f1e2a/icloud 
• https://support.apple.com/en-us/118443 
• https://support.apple.com/en-us/118225 

My recommendation would be to combine methods instead of choosing just one.  Backup Mac without iCloud, then keep your most important documents in the cloud as an extra layer of protection. So, if you're unable to restore a backup, you'll still have access to cloud-only files, which is better than nothing

If you want to look beyond Time Machine, there are plenty of other options too - this guide explains how to backup Mac to SSD or external hard drive, backup Mac to cloud, and even how to backup Mac to NAS if you want automatic backups over your home network. It’s definitely worth a read.

But if you want the short version: combine Time Machine with cloud storage for your most important files, and you’re covered no matter what happens.

I never thought about how to back up my MacBook either. I’ve always just copied everything manually to an external SSD and followed the 3-2-1 backup rule. Whenever I buy a new Mac or reset the current one, I simply migrate data myself instead of restoring the whole system. I’ve been doing it that way for years and have never even used Time Machine restore. It’s definitely more manual, but I like knowing exactly what gets copied instead of bringing old apps and settings over with the backup.

Have you thought about just doing a backup Mac to external drive by creating a disk image? It’s more for saving your files than your apps or settings, but for some people that’s all they really need.

You can read more about how it works here. And if you don’t already have a program for creating disk images, there’s also a list of recommended tools here (Disk Drill is on it, along with a few other options).

When I was searching for how to back up MacBook Air, and especially how to backup Mac automatically, the thing that sold me on Time Machine was local snapshots. If you’ve already set up Time Machine but simply forgot to plug in your backup drive, newer Macs will still create local snapshots. I don’t consider them a real backup because they’re stored on the same SSD, but if you accidentally delete a file and notice it right away, a snapshot might save you. Considering how recovery works on modern Mac SSDs, I think that’s a pretty underrated feature.

Our main focus is data recovery and troubleshooting rather than backups, so we don’t have a huge collection of backup articles. We do, however, have a forum thread comparing different backup software(here) if you’re interested in alternatives to Time Machine. There’s quite a bit of useful discussion there.

You may also find our Mac startup disk recovery thread helpful. Although it’s primarily about recovering a startup disk, a good part of the discussion covers why backups matter on modern Macs and different approaches, including create bootable Mac backup (here).

You’ve already gotten a lot of good advice and different perspectives here, so I’ll just add one thing from our side. If your goal is to actually get your data back no matter what happens, Time Machine backups are still the most reliable option on modern Macs. The reason is that today’s Macs use SSDs, and once data is deleted, TRIM starts clearing those blocks very quickly. A factory reset falls into the same category. We mention this in pretty much every one of our Mac recovery guides because it’s one of the biggest reasons why recovery from an internal SSD is so limited.

Thanks a lot, everyone! I read through all the replies, and I think I’ll stick with Time Machine. It’s free, it comes with macOS, and after reading everything here it honestly feels silly not to use it.