Proxmox Backup Client on Windows - Example Script

Proxmox Backup Server (PBS) is a dedicated linux backup appliance that stores encrypted, deduplicated, incremental file backups from clients.

Proxmox Backup Client (PBC) is a command line tool that sends backups to a PBS server over a network.
There is no official Windows PBC, but the community has provided a Go‑language re‑implementation of the official Proxmox Backup Client (PBC), compiled as a single native Windows executable.
It speaks the same API as Proxmox Backup Server (PBS), uses the same encryption model, and produces fully compatible backup snapshots.

This is a script wrapper for proxmoxbackupclientgo that can be readily fired from a scheduler tool.

Prerequisites

• An instance of Proxmox Backup Server
• A token from PBS e.g. user@pbs!tokenid
• A token secret (or token password)
• The PBS 'fingerprint'

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Install proxmoxbackupclient_go

Since proxmoxbackupclient_go.exe is a standalone, statically compiled executable, it does not require a traditional "installation" wizard.
Simply place the file on your system and run it via the command line.

Download and Placement

Download: Get the latest release for Windows (usually a .zip or just the .exe file) from the project's repository. Proxmox Backup Client (Go)

Location: Move the .exe to a permanent folder on your system. A common practice is:

C:\Program Files\PBS-Client\

Path (Optional): To run the command from any folder, add this directory to your Windows Environment Variables (System Path).

Prepare Proxmox Backup Server (PBS)

Before running the client, you need an API Token from your Proxmox Backup Server:

Log in to your PBS Web UI.

Go to Configuration → Access Control → API Tokens.

Add a new token and assign it the DatastoreBackup role for your specific datastore.

Important: Copy the Secret immediately, as it will not be shown again.

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Using the Script

• Before doing anything, confirm that the proxmoxbackupclient_go.exe is working in your required location by either double-clicking it or running in the terminal.
• Edit & save the Environment variables in the .cmd script
• run your prepared script.
• check results in PBS

Scheduling

Once running it is a fairly simple job to setup a routine schedule in TASK SCHEDULER

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.