Back up and import a Blogger blog: content and theme

Back up before you edit the theme, before you delete anything and now and then in between. It takes a minute.

Two different backups

A Blogger blog has two things worth saving: the content (posts, pages and comments) and the theme (the design). They are saved in different places.

Back up the content

1. Sign in to Blogger and choose the blog.
2. Open Settings.
3. Under Manage blog, click Back up content, then Download.

Blogger's help says that you can also use Google Takeout directly, switching to a Google Account that is an administrator of the blog. In a Takeout backup, look for the Blogger folder, then the folder with your blog's name, and inside it a file called feed.atom: that is the file that contains your posts and comments.

Save a copy of the theme

1. Open Theme.
2. Beside the Customize button, click the down arrow.
3. Choose Backup, then Download.

You get an XML file with the theme. Keep it somewhere safe and name it with the date.

Import content

To import posts, pages and comments, you upload the feed.atom file from a Takeout backup, or an older Blogger backup .xml file. Blogger's help says that older .xml files can be imported in the same way.

1. Open Settings.
2. Under Manage blog, click Import content, then Import.
3. Decide whether to publish the imported posts at once. If you do not want that, turn off "Automatically publish all imported posts and pages".
4. Choose the file on your computer and click Open.

Blogger notes that there is a daily limit on the number of files you can import, with no limit on file size.

Restore a theme

In Theme, use the down arrow beside Customize and choose Restore, then pick the XML file. After you restore a theme, open Layout and check that your page elements (gadgets) are still in place, then click Save.

A backup routine

• Before every theme edit: download the theme.
• After a big writing session or every month: download the content.
• Keep two copies in different places, for example your computer and a cloud drive.
• Check that the file is not empty by looking at its size.

What a backup does not include

A backup holds posts, pages and comments. Images that are stored on Blogger are not inside the file as pictures; the posts point to them. Settings such as the custom domain and the search description are not in the file either, so write them down.

This is an independent guide. It is not connected with Google or Blogger. Blogger, AdSense and Google are names of Google LLC. The steps follow Blogger Help and AdSense Help as read on 13 November 2026; the Blogger screens change from time to time, so a menu may be named a little differently on your screen.