In backup planning, what describes a balanced backup approach?

• A. It should rely only on full backups
• B. It may include both full backups and incremental backups to balance recovery time and storage
• C. It should rely only on incremental backups
• D. It eliminates the need for backups altogether

Answer: (B)

In backup planning, it's important to balance how quickly you can recover data with how much storage you need to protect it. A full backup copies everything at a given time, which makes restoring a complete system straightforward and fast, but it can take a long time to run and consumes a lot of storage space. Incremental backups capture only what has changed since the last backup, so they’re quick and save storage, but restoring requires starting from a recent full backup and then applying every subsequent incremental in order, which can be slower and riskier if any piece is missing.

A balanced approach combines these methods: perform full backups at regular, longer intervals and do incremental backups in between. This keeps daily backup windows short and storage usage reasonable, while still providing a reliable path to restore to the most recent point in time by using the latest full backup plus the latest incrementals. Periodically refreshing with another full backup resets the chain and keeps restore complexity manageable.

The other options misalign with this balance. Relying only on full backups wastes time and storage, while relying only on incremental backups makes restores more fragile and longer to complete. Eliminating backups altogether defeats the purpose of protection.