Website Recovery: Get the Site and the Data Back
A site that has gone missing, broken, or been compromised is a different kind of problem. The first question is not "what should we build" — it is "what can we actually get back, and how".
We assess what survives, choose the right recovery path, restore the site, and then close the door that let the problem in.
Site down right now? Start with Emergency Website Support so we can contain it first.
1,000+ represents websites served cumulatively, not current actively maintained sites. 2 hours means initial response on business days, not a fix time or 24/7 service.
Three Situations, Three Recovery Paths
Recovery is not one procedure. The right path depends on what happened — and each path has a different risk of data loss.
Recovery from a backup
The cleanest case. We locate the most recent verified backup, restore it, and reconcile anything that changed since. Loss is usually limited to the gap between the backup and the failure.
Recovery after a hack
Restoring alone is not enough — the compromised site would simply be attacked again. We restore from a clean point, remove the entry point, and only then close the incident.
Recovery from a failed change
A bad update, a broken deployment or a corrupted database can take a working site down. We identify the last good state and roll back to it, then work out why the change failed.
If you need a live standby site that takes over automatically, that is high-availability disaster recovery — a larger, separately scoped engagement. We will say so rather than let you assume it is included.
What Determines Whether Recovery Is Possible
The honest answer to "can you get it back" depends on a handful of facts. Here is how the situation usually maps to the outcome.
| The situation | What it depends on | Realistic outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Recent, tested backup exists | Backup accessibility and how recent it is. | Full restore, minimal loss. Hours, not days. |
| Backup exists but is old | How much content was added since that point. | Restore plus partial reconstruction of newer work. |
| No usable backup at all | Cached copies, exports and any surviving files. | Partial recovery, or a rebuild. Assessed first. |
| Site hacked with a backdoor | Whether the clean restore point precedes the intrusion. | Restore from a clean point and remove the entry route. |
| Credentials or provider access lost | Who controls the domain, host and account. | Recovery can stall until ownership is re-established. |
This is why we assess before quoting. A promise of full recovery made before anyone has looked at what remains is not a plan — it is a guess.
What We Need From You
Recovery moves fastest when a few things are available. In an urgent situation we can work around gaps, but each one adds time.
Access to the right accounts
Hosting, platform and domain access — or a way to reach someone who holds them. Where possible we use access you already own.
A rough last-known-good date
Even an approximate "it was fine last Tuesday" narrows down where the problem started and how far back to restore.
Where backups live, if anywhere
Host snapshots, a backup plugin, a third-party service or an old export. We check all of them rather than assuming there is none.
A view on acceptable data loss
Whether it is more important to be back online quickly, or to preserve every recent change. That choice shapes the path.
What changed most recently
A recent update, plugin, host migration or theme change is often the trigger — and the clue to the cause.
Anything you have already tried
So we do not repeat a step, and so we know what state the site and database are currently in.
How Recovery Runs
Four stages, in the order that keeps the most data recoverable.
1. Assess
We find out what happened, what survives and what can be restored.
2. Choose the path
Restore, clean-and-restore, or rebuild — whichever loses the least.
3. Restore
The site and its data are brought back, in a safe order, with checks along the way.
4. Verify and harden
We confirm the site works, then close the route that caused the failure.
Related: Website Backup Services · Hacked Website & Malware Removal · Website Repair
Self-Restore vs Professional Recovery
If you have a backup, you can often try restoring it yourself. Here is when that works, and when it does not.
Restoring it yourself
- Works when there is a recent backup you know is clean
- Requires access to the host, database and files
- Risks overwriting data that was not in the backup
- May restore the problem along with the site if the backup predates the intrusion
- Leaves the entry point in place if the cause is not identified
Professional recovery
- Assesses which copies are clean before restoring anything
- Preserves what can still be salvaged from the live site
- Handles the database as well as the files
- Removes the entry point so the failure does not recur
- Gives you a written account of what happened and what was restored
Silent Failures Are What We Catch
A site that goes down is obvious. The failures that cost the most are the quiet ones. A contact form stops sending. A checkout breaks for one payment method. Pages quietly drop out of search. Speed slips a little every week. Nothing crashes, so nothing shouts — the leads just stop.
That is the failure mode we watch for. Alongside uptime, we monitor the signals that go silent:
Form submissions
We test that your forms still reach their destination, so a broken contact or quote form does not sit unnoticed for weeks.
Checkout and orders
For stores, we watch the order path and flag signs that a payment step has stopped completing.
Search indexing
We check that your pages stay indexed, and that nothing is accidentally blocked from search after a change.
Speed and Core Web Vitals
We track real performance over time and flag gradual decline before it starts costing you conversions.
And You Hear About It Every Month
A maintenance plan should not be a silent invoice. Every month you receive a short report: what we updated and checked, what monitoring caught, what we fixed, and how much of your included hours were used. If nothing went wrong, the report still tells you what was verified — so “nothing happened” shows up as visible work, not silence.
You Own Your Site. Always.
Your domain, your hosting account, and your code belong to you. A maintenance provider should never be the only one holding the keys.
Your assets stay in your name
Domain, hosting, and site files remain yours and under your control. We work with your access — we do not take ownership of it.
A clean handover if you leave
If you move on, the agreement sets out how access, files, and credentials are returned. We do not hold your domain, and we do not charge a release fee.
This is written into our agreement, not just promised on a page.
Website Recovery FAQ
Can you recover a website if there is no backup?
Sometimes, but not always — and we will tell you honestly which case you are in before you commit. With no backup, recovery may mean rebuilding from cached pages, exports and any surviving copies, which is slower and may not be complete. The best protection against this is a verified backup in place before you need it.
How much data will I lose?
That depends on the age of the last good copy. If there is a recent verified backup, loss is usually limited to changes made since that point. If the most recent usable backup is weeks old, content added since then may need to be reproduced. We assess this first so you know the likely loss before we start.
How long does a recovery take?
A straightforward restore from a recent backup is measured in hours. A hacked site, a corrupt database or a recovery with no backup takes longer and is scoped after an initial assessment. We give you a realistic window rather than a hopeful one.
My site was hacked — do you restore it or clean it?
Usually both, in a specific order. We restore from a known-clean point where possible, then remove the entry point so the same compromise does not return. Malware removal and cleanup are a separate, scoped service; the restore and the cleanup are quoted together so you can see the full picture.
Do you need my hosting or control panel login?
We need access to perform the recovery, and we ask for the minimum required. Do not send credentials by email — we agree an access method and a scope in writing first, and hand back or rotate credentials when the job is done.
Is recovery the same as your backup service?
No. Backup is prevention — the copy you keep in case something goes wrong. Recovery is the event itself: using that copy, or another route, to bring the site back. The two belong together, which is why we verify that backups can actually be restored.
Do you provide full disaster recovery with a standby site?
High-availability disaster recovery — a live standby site that takes over automatically — is a much larger engagement than a standard restore, and we scope it separately. If that is what you need, we will tell you plainly rather than imply we provide it by default.
What is the difference between a backup and disaster recovery?
A backup is a copy of something. Disaster recovery is the whole path back to a working business: knowing what to restore, in what order, from where, with which credentials, and how long it takes. People discover the difference when the host account is gone, the backup was never tested, or the credentials were in the same account that was lost.
Related Recovery and Protection Services
Recovery From More Than a Bad Update
Most recovery requests start with a failed update or a hack. The harder cases begin with something that removes your access entirely — and those are the ones worth planning for before they happen.
The distinction that matters: a backup is a copy of something; disaster recovery is the whole path back to a working business — what to restore, in what order, from where, with which credentials, and how long it takes. Many businesses have backups and still have no recovery path, and they find out which one they had on the worst possible day.
Cases we see
- A failed update or plugin conflict
- A hack with data or files altered
- Content or pages deleted by mistake
- A host account suspended or lost
- Credentials lost with a departed employee
- Ransomware or encrypted files
- DNS or domain control taken over
What determines the outcome
- How recent the last verified backup is
- Whether code, database, files and configuration are all captured
- Whether you still control the domain and hosting account
- Whether credentials exist outside the system that was lost
- How quickly the problem was contained
One honest boundary: at maintenance-plan pricing there is no hot standby server waiting to take over. What we can do is make sure a restore actually works, that the pieces needed are all captured, and that access does not sit in a single person’s hands — which is what turns most emergencies into long outages.
The preventive side of this is verified backups and monitoring; the incident side is hacked site cleanup and emergency support.
Find Out What Can Be Recovered
Send the site URL and a short note about what happened. We will assess what survives and tell you the realistic path back.
Not urgent yet? Set up verified backups before you need them.