Backup Directly to Z1 Storage with Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud

Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud can back up your workloads directly to S3-compatible storage — no gateway or intermediate staging required. Add Z1 Storage as a backup location once, and any protection plan can target it. This guide follows the current Cyber Protect Cloud console workflow.

Z1 Storage settings at a glance: Endpoint: https://s3.z1storage.com | Location type: S3 compatible | Access keys: from your client area

Prerequisites

• Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud with a local backup storage quota assigned to the tenant (public-cloud backup locations consume this quota type)
• At least one protection agent registered in the Cyber Protect console — an agent from version 24.06 or later if you plan to use immutability
• A Z1 Storage account with a bucket created for Acronis backups. For immutable backups, create the bucket with Object Lock enabled (Advanced Settings at creation — see our Object Lock guide)

Step 1: Add Z1 Storage as a backup location

You can define the location while creating a protection plan (click the link in the Where to back up row), or centrally under Backup storage:

1. In the Cyber Protect console, go to Backup storage and click Add location.
2. From the Public clouds dropdown, select S3 compatible.
3. In the Management agent field, click Browse and pick one of your agents (Windows, Linux, VMware appliance, Hyper-V or oVirt). This agent only establishes the initial connection to Z1 Storage — its later online/offline state does not affect backups run by other agents.
4. Enter a Location name, e.g. Z1 Storage (names must be unique within your tenant).
5. Enter the connection details:
   • Endpoint URL: https://s3.z1storage.com
   • Access Key ID / Secret Access Key: your Z1 Storage keys
   • Leave Allow using a self-signed certificate unticked — Z1 Storage uses a valid certificate. (This choice is permanent for the location.)
6. In the Bucket field, select your Z1 bucket.
7. If the bucket was created with Object Lock and versioning, the Backup immutability period (days) checkbox becomes available — tick it and set your retention window to make every backup tamper-proof for that period.
8. Click Add.

Step 2: Point a protection plan at Z1 Storage

1. Go to Devices, select the workload and create or edit its protection plan.
2. In the Backup module, set Where to back up to the Z1 Storage location you created.
3. Configure what to back up, the schedule and retention as usual, then apply the plan. Backups now flow directly from the agent to Z1 Storage — data stays in South Africa end to end.

Immutability notes (worth reading before you enable it)

• Agent version matters. Only agents 24.06+ apply Object Lock to created objects; older agents silently ignore the immutability period and fall back to the bucket's default Object Lock properties.
• The location's immutability period takes precedence over the bucket's default retention, and the agent automatically extends immutability on older objects that newer backups in the chain still depend on.
• Configure a lifecycle policy on the bucket when using immutability: versioned, locked buckets otherwise retain object versions forever and storage consumption grows indefinitely. Lifecycle and versioning settings for Z1 buckets are managed in your client portal.
• Don't enable versioning/Object Lock on a bucket used by a non-immutable Acronis location — lifecycle policies on such buckets can delete objects that backup archive chains depend on and corrupt the archive.

Verify

Run the plan once, confirm the backup completes in the Cyber Protect console, and check the objects in your Z1 interface. Then do what most people skip: test a restore.

With Acronis handling protection and Z1 Storage providing affordable, POPIA-friendly storage at R0.30/GB/month with free uploads, your backups stay local, immutable and predictable. Sign up — first 10GB free.