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PROS:
CONS:
Carbonite has one of the most helpful web pages we’ve reviewed so far. Aside from a searchable knowledgebase and a FAQ section, the site has many useful new information updated daily. You can get in touch with customer support via phone, email or live chat. An advanced form of a virtual assistant is omnipresent throughout the site so you can always rely on a quick answer should you need it.
Carbonite is probably the online data backup service with the most interesting name. It gets its notable name from Star Wars Episode V where Han Solo gets frozen in carbonite. In the saga world, this liquid is used to preserve good qualities in goods, people and robots. Despite the amusing etymology of its name, Carbonite showed to be an average data backup service with good value mostly for single users.
Value for money
Carbonite offers three “home” subscription types – Personal Basic, Plus and Prime. All three plans are covered with unlimited storage for one PC. For the purpose of our review, we looked at the Personal Basic plan since it showed the best value for money compared to the other options we looked at. Valued differently, the other Personal plans offer the same storage options just with a different set of more advanced features.
The personal Basic plan got an A for its $59.55/year price for unlimited storage. The downside to its amazing price is that, even though you are not limited when it comes to storage space, you can only back up one PC with one license. In our review for larger and smaller families, Carbonite got a D since each computer you own needs its own separate license that can cost a family of three more than $150 a year. Comparably, some of the best online data backup services in our review would cost a small household with three PCs less than $20 annually.
Features
Carbonite allows you upload photos, videos, music or documents you wish to make a backup of. The service also gives you the option of syncing your devices to a shared folder where you can upload/download all, or just selected files. Its desktop app works in the background with minimal intervention from the user.
Price: $59.95
Backup
Carbonite got an average mark on the backup speed test. We ran multiple backup sets at different times of day/night as well as the weekend in order to get the most optimal result. We measured the average MB/min speed at which the service uploaded 1TB of data to its servers. Carbonite took almost 21 days to finish the backup process which is also the industry average time for it.
Restoration
It didn’t do too fast in the file restoration either. To measure the speed at which you can restore files you previously backed up to Carbonite’s servers, we ran several restore sets and recorded the average MB/min speed for 1TB of data. It took almost four weeks for Carbonite to complete the full process. Even though this is still about the industry average, it is well below the fastest service in our review.
Protection
Carbonite prides itself in taking your privacy very seriously. To secure your data, it uses the military-grade 128-bit encryption as well as the advanced Transport Layer Security (TLS/SSL) to make your files bulletproof during transfer. Your files are encrypted while you’re backing up/restoring and while they’re sitting on the servers.
Carbonite recorded an average backup/restore speed on our test. Both tests took more than 20 days to finish uploading/downloading 1TB of data. The sharing app is easy to use and you can sync all your devices together. It’s perfect for single users since it only offers one license per subscription.
Email:
To contact customer support via email, you need to fill out a request through this link: support.carbonite.com/contact-us
Phone number:
USA: 877-222-5488
International: 1 617-587-1100
Website: www.carbonite.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CarboniteOnlineBackup/
Carbonite has one the most helpful web pages we’ve reviewed so far. Aside from a searchable knowledgebase and a FAQ section, the site has many useful new information updated daily. You can get in touch with customer support via phone, email or live chat. An advanced form of a virtual assistant is omnipresent throughout the site so you can always rely on a quick answer should you need it.
Our editorial staff evaluates products and services independently, but Best Review Guide may earn money when you click on links. Read our advertising disclosure.
By: Kurtis | Last updated January 23, 2021 
