Unsupported scenarios and limitations on M365 backup powered by Veeam


Microsoft SharePoint / Teams – Backup limitations & Unsupported scenarios

  • Backup exclusions cannot be set for SharePoint or Teams.

  • The SharePoint site collection recycle bin is not supported for backup.

  • A SharePoint Site Collection hierarchy is not supported if the root site was not configured.

  • External SharePoint lists are not supported for backup.

  • As part of Microsoft Teams data backup, M365 backup powered by Veeam backs up only the following types of channel tabs: Website, Planner, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Visio, PDF, Document Library, OneNote, SharePoint, Stream, Forms, Power BI, Power Automate (ex Flow) and Azure DevOps.

  • SharePoint objects cannot be backed up without a valid Microsoft 365 license with SharePoint plan enabled.

  • When you perform a backup of Microsoft Teams data, M365 backup powered by Veeam does not back up the following objects:
    • Private channels.
    • One-on-one and group chats.
      For more information about chats in Microsoft Teams, see this Microsoft article. You can use Veeam Explorer for Microsoft Exchange to explore data from user mailboxes and view chat messages as MSG files.
    • Audio and video calls.
    • Video recordings.
    • Contacts.
    • Calendar: information about meetings and meeting chats.
    • Code snippets in posts.
    • Banner notifications in posts.
    • Data of applications added as channel tabs (such as Website, Planner, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Visio, PDF, Document Library, OneNote, SharePoint, Stream, Forms, Power BI, Power Automate and Azure DevOps) and other 3rd party applications if their data does not reside in the SharePoint document library of the team.

Microsoft Exchange - Backup limitations & Unsupported scenarios

  • Due to Microsoft limitations, M365 backup powered by Veeam does not back up the following objects for Microsoft 365 organizations with enabled security defaults: Discovery Search Mailboxes, Public Folder Mailboxes and Dynamic Distribution Groups.

  • Backup exclusions cannot be set for Public Mailbox objects.

  • M365 backup powered by Veeam backs up public folders that are located under the IPM_SUBTREE folder only.

  • User mailboxes cannot be backed up without a valid Microsoft 365 license

General - Backup limitations & Unsupported scenarios

  • Project Web Apps backup is not supported.

  • OneNote notebooks may not be backed up if their size is more than 2 GB.

  • OneDrive for Business objects cannot be backed up without a valid Microsoft 365 license with SharePoint plan enabled.

  • Backup jobs management can only be performed by Sherweb.

  • Immutability cannot be enabled on backups. 

Restore limitations & Unsupported scenarios

General

  • Restoral of OneNote tabs from backups of Microsoft Teams data may fail if the OneNote tab name includes non-Latin or special characters.

  • Some restore options of OneNote notebooks may not work. Please use export procedures for OneNote notebooks.

  • The Self-Service Restore Portal only allows you to explore and restore data from the latest restore point that is available.

  • Using the Self-Service Restore Portal, items of distinct types that you added to the restore list (for example, mailbox items, OneDrive and SharePoint files) will not be restored simultaneously. You must configure and run different restore operations for Exchange, SharePoint and OneDrive items.

  • A guest user cannot be used as a restore operator.


Microsoft Teams

  • Microsoft Teams messages cannot be restored directly back to Teams.

  • Microsoft Teams data is not supported for explore or restore using the Self-Service Restore Portal.

  • You can restore Microsoft Teams data to the original organization only.

  • Restoral of OneNote notebooks from backups of Microsoft Teams data for organizations with enabled security defaults using multi-factor authentication is not supported.

  • When restoring a channel tab, "Veeam Explorer for Microsoft Teams" does not preserve relation between the link to a file published on the tab and the file itself. You will need to link the tab to the file manually after restore. This limitation does not apply to the scenario where you restore an entire team.

  • "Veeam Explorer for Microsoft Teams" does not restore posts to their original location in the team channel. Instead, "Veeam Explorer for Microsoft Teams" exports posts to a file of the HTML format, creates a separate tab in the original channel and attaches the HTML file to this tab.

  • M365 backup powered by Veeam does not restore posts to their original location in the team channel. Instead, M365 backup powered by Veeam creates a new tab in the original channel and restores posts to this tab.


Microsoft Exchange

  • Public folders can only be restored if they are located under the IPM_SUBTREE folder.

  • Bulk restore (restoral of multiple objects) is not supported for public folder mailboxes. Use the regular per-object restore instead.

  • Bulk restoral of Exchange mailboxes can be performed to the original location only. Use the regular per-object restore if you want to restore mailboxes to another location.

  • Group mailboxes data is not supported for explore and restore using the Self-Service Restore Portal.

  • Using the Self-Service Restore Portal, items of other Exchange types (Appointment, Contact, Task) than Email that you restore may not be displayed properly if a different restore location is chosen.


Microsoft SharePoint

  • SharePoint Sites can only be restored to the existing site collection. Creating a new collection is not supported.

  • Some lists (including hidden lists) are not supported for restore using Veeam Explorer for Microsoft SharePoint, please see the list here: https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backup/explorers/unsupported_sharepoint_lists.html?ver=110

  • Even though the option is available in “Veeam Explorer for Microsoft SharePoint” to restore to alternative locations than the current tenant (like On-Premises Microsoft SharePoint server), sites can only be restored to the existing site collection. Creating a new collection is not supported.

  • Even though the option is available in “Veeam Explorer for Microsoft SharePoint” to restore to alternative locations than the current tenant (like On-Premises Microsoft SharePoint server), document libraries and lists can only be restored back to the source site from which they were backed up.

References

https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/vbo365/guide/vbo_considerations.html?ver=60

https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backup/explorers/vet_considerations.html?ver=110

https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backup/explorers/vesp_recovery_specials.html?ver=110

https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backup/explorers/vex_considerations.html?ver=110