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Restoring from a database backup on Windows (MW3)
Restoring from a database backup on Windows (MW3)

Please note this article refers to an older version of MoneyWiz.

Iliya Yordanov avatar
Written by Iliya Yordanov
Updated over 3 years ago

Solutions presented in this article apply to MoneyWiz 2/3 only. If you're using MoneyWiz 2022, please see this article instead.

In this guide, we'll restore your database to an earlier state using a database backup you've made before. There will be 3 steps we’ll need to take (4 if you’re using SYNCbits to sync your data). Feel free to contact us at any time. If in your e-mail you’ll mention that you’ve seen this guide and tell us which step you got stuck on, this will eliminate the need for us to ask questions, improving the case resolution time.

Step 1: Access your MoneyWiz for Windows backups

If you already have extracted the database backup you want to use, skip this step.

Please navigate to your backups folder. If while setting it up, you’ve set a different path, please access that now. In this guide, we’ll use the default one.

Open Windows Explorer folder browser and click on the address bar. In there, type:

%APPDATA%

and press Enter. This should get you to the following path:

C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\

However, it is possible that you’ve been placed in a variation of that folder, for example “Roaming”. If that’s the case, just click on “AppData” in your address bar to get out of Roaming folder (which is inside AppData). Then please navigate to Local -> SilverWiz -> MoneyWiz. Your final path should be the following:

C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Local\SilverWiz\MoneyWiz\

The backup file will have a name like this:

2018-02-09 02_57_46-moneywiz-backup.zip

Step 2: Open the backup file

Suggestion: duplicate the backup file before you begin. In case anything goes wrong, you still have an intact version of the backup.

Your backup file is a regular ZIP archive. Just click twice on it or right-click and open in your favorite ZIP archive application to access the backup. Inside, you’ll find a “moneywiz-release.db” file – that is your database.

Step 3: Replace the database backup

In order to restore from backup, you simply need to replace the “moneywiz-release.db” file from your MoneyWiz database folder (C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Local\SilverWiz\MoneyWiz\moneywiz-release.db) with the one from your backup.

That’s it – you have now successfully restored from backup. If you do not use our SYNCbits syncing service, you are done. If you do use SYNCbits syncing service, there is one more step. If you are not sure, just follow the step below as well.

Step 4: Re-creating your SYNCbits account

If you have a SYNCbits account, all of your account changes are securely stored on our SYNCbits server. You have restored your local database but if you simply launch the application, MoneyWiz will notice that newer changes are present on the server and will just overwrite the earlier backup you wanted to restore.

To prevent this from happening, we need to re-create your SYNCbits account with the backup data you have. To do so:

  1. Disable all forms of internet connectivity on your computer: WiFi, Ethernet, LTE shared from your phone – everything. Your PC must not be able to connect to the Internet.

  2. Launch MoneyWiz for Windows and verify that the data you’ve restored is OK.

  3. Double-check that you are using SYNCbits service – look at the MoneyWiz sidebar to the left. Do you see your e-mail there? If yes – proceed to step 4. If not, this means you are not using SYNCbits and you can skip this step. In that case, it’s safe to re-enable Internet on your PC.

  4. If you do see your e-mail in the sidebar, please go to Settings (access it by clicking on the little cog icon at the bottom of the sidebar) -> SYNCbits and click 10 times on your e-mail until a hidden menu appears. Find one called Desync.

  5. Click on that option and wait for your e-mail to disappear from the sidebar. If this happens, it’s safe to re-enable your Internet connectivity.

  6. Please e-mail us (contact information can be found here) pointing to this article, explaining that you are trying to restore from Windows backup and that you have successfully completed all 4 steps and wish to re-create your SYNCbits account. If you do not include that, we’ll need to ask questions to make sure that all steps were completed as we don’t want to risk your data getting lost. When writing your message, please: a) make sure you’re writing from the e-mail address that is your SYNCbits account, b) tell us on which other devices you’re using MoneyWiz on as well.

  7. Wait for us to get back to you. In the meantime, it’s safe to use MoneyWiz on this PC but please do not launch or use MoneyWiz on other devices – we’ll tell you what to do about them.

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