N8N Backup Flow to Nextcloud (7-Day Retention)

Description

This workflow automates the daily backup of all your n8n workflows to a designated folder in Nextcloud. It ensures that you always have the last 7 days of backups available while automatically deleting older ones to save space.


🔧 Features

Scheduled Trigger: Runs automatically once per day (can be executed manually as well).

Directory Management: Creates the /N8N-Backup directory in Nextcloud if it doesn't already exist.

Backup Collection: Retrieves all workflows from the n8n instance.

JSON Conversion: Converts each workflow into a JSON file.

Upload to Nextcloud: Saves each backup file into the specified backup directory.

Retention Control: Keeps only the latest 7 backups and deletes the rest from Nextcloud.

📌 Notes

Make sure to manually create the /N8N-Backup directory in your Nextcloud account before using this flow.

Update the Backup Path node if you wish to change the upload directory.

Ideal for teams using n8n with self-hosted instances and requiring offsite backup via Nextcloud.

🔒 Requirements

n8n instance with access to the Nextcloud node.

Valid credentials for your Nextcloud account with API access.


Update: 08/11/2025 “Backup Flows to Nextcloud” – Import format fixed

Summary:
The workflow now exports one clean JSON object per workflow (no arrays, no backup/meta fields), so files can be imported 1:1 via the n8n UI.

What changed:

Switched from “Convert to File” to a Set node that builds the JSON in binary data.

Enabled filters.include = "all" on Get many workflows to include nodes, connections, settings, pinData, and tags.

Sanitized filenames and removed IDs/metadata that can break UI imports.

Fixed Nextcloud path and binary property mapping (data).

Verification:

Generated multiple backups and imported each via UI (“Import from file”) without errors.

Each file begins with { (single object) and loads with full workflow structure.

Notes:

Keep “Binary Property” set to data in the Nextcloud node.

Filenames are sanitized to avoid special-character issues.