Backup Playstation 3 Saves

For the most part, backing up individual Playstation 3 save files is easy. And believe it or not, backing up saves for 'normal' PS3 games and minis is very similar to how you Backup PS2 Classic saves and how you Backup PS one Classic saves.

 I say "for the most part" because you cannot backup certain types of saves individually. I will get to that in a little bit. For now, I'll walk you through the PS3 save backup process.

What You Will Need

You will need a flash drive with enough space for the save(s) you are saving. Save file sized can vary wildly. Some are around 100KB (kilobytes) in size, while others can be much larger.

Make sure that this flash drive is formatted as FAT or FAT32. You can check this on your computer before starting.

Backup Individual PS3 Saves

 From PS3 to Flash Drive

Make sure that your system is on.

1. Connect your flash drive to the PS3
2. Go to the Game menu on the PS3 menu
3. Using a controller, scroll-up in the Game menu until 'Saved Data Utility (PS3)' is highlighted
4. Press X
5. Keep pressing Square until individual saves appear (no folder icons except for 'Online storage')
6. Select the save file you want to copy
7. Press Triangle and select the 'Copy' option with X
8. Follow the on-screen prompts (your flash drive should be near the top of the device list)
9. Remove the flash drive from the PS3

Games will commonly have multiple save files. You'll have to backup each individual one that you want to keep. For example, WipEout HD has individual save files for 'ghost ship data,' so you'll want to back those up if you want to keep your ghosts.

From Flash Drive to PS3

Make sure that your system is on.

1. Connect your flash drive to the PS3
2. Go to the games menu on the PS3 menu (the header just says 'Game' and shows a controller)
3. Using a controller, scroll-up in the Game menu until 'Saved Data Utility (PS3)' is highlighted
4. Press X, highlight the device (should be 2nd from top), and press X again
5. Highlight the game that you want to backup
6. Press Triangle and select the 'Copy' option with X
7. Follow the on-screen prompts
8. Remove the flash drive from the PS3

Backup Individual 'minis' Saves

The process for backing-up and restoring saves for minis games is the same as the process for backing up 'normal' saves. They are located in the 'Saved Data Utility (minis/PSP)' folder.

Where Are My Saves?

The backup process creates a 'PS3' folder in the root of your flash drive. Your PS3 saves are located at:

PS3\SAVEDATA\

Each save has its own folder with multiple files.

I'm not sure how minis are backed-up. I'll update this article once I do.

What Cannot Be Saved (Individually)?

There are saves for certain games that cannot be backed-up individually. These are located in the 'Game Data Utility' folder. Some of the items in this folder aren't even save games: installed data and DLC are also included. LittleBigPlanet and LittleBigPlanet 2 have locked-down saves, presumably because they also contain DLC data.

To backup these files, you must use the Backup Utility.