Steam Cloud is not a backup strategy. Hoard is.
Hoard is an open-source (AGPL-3.0) game save backup and sync system. Run the server on your own hardware, or use Hoard Cloud hosted in the EU — the desktop app and the CLI work the same against either. Self-hosting needs no Hoard account and has no quota beyond your own disk.
Ships in eight languages, Spanish included.
Steam Cloud, GOG Galaxy and friends work fine — right up until they overwrite a 200-hour save with a corrupted one from another machine, the publisher kills the service, or the game just isn't covered. Hoard is the boring, paranoid alternative: it snapshots your saves every time you stop playing, hashes every file, and lets you roll back to any earlier version or pull your entire library onto a fresh machine. Nothing is ever silently overwritten — that's the entire point.
Auto-detects your games. Watches your saves. Syncs in the background. Rolls back when things go wrong. That's it. That's Hoard.
Available on Windows, Linux, and macOS. Also includes a headless CLI that runs as a background service — perfect for servers and Steam Decks. No desktop required, just set it and forget it.
One codebase, two ways to run it:
- Hoard Cloud — the hosted service at hoard.services. Sign in with Google, install the app, done. Free tier: 2 GB, 3 devices, full version history — free forever.
- Self-hosted — run the same
hoard-serverbinary on your own box and point the app at it. No account, no quota — just your cloud.
Pro (from 1.99 €/month) gives you 100 GB — I don't profit from it. It unlocks Hoard Screen, an in-game overlay to browse and roll back snapshots without alt-tabbing. Free includes a 1-week trial.
Hoard Wrapped is completely free — just a Spotify-Wrapped-style recap of your year in games.
Pricing and free trial at hoard.services/pricing.
Necessity is the mother of invention — I created Hoard because I needed it.
| Feature | What it means for you |
|---|---|
| Versioned | Every session = new snapshot. Roll back to any previous version. Old saves never expire (self-hosted) or until you hit your quota (Cloud). |
| Verified | Every file SHA256-hashed on upload, re-verified on restore. Corruption caught before it overwrites your good save. |
| Compact | Content-hash deduplication: 10 versions of a 2 GB save cost ~2 GB, not 20 GB. Transfers are zstd-compressed; restores byte-for-byte (SHA-256 verified). |
| Auto-detect | 20,000+ games from the Ludusavi manifest + your Steam libraries + running processes + filesystem scan. Zero config for normal games. |
| Emulator support (beta) | PCSX2, RPCS3, DuckStation, PPSSPP, Dolphin, Cemu, Ryujinx, Citra/Azahar, RetroArch, mGBA, melonDS, Project64. Pick from presets, tracked like any other gam -- you can manually add others. |
| Cross-platform | Windows · Linux · macOS. One click install, no compiler, no dependencies -- Steam Deck compatible |
| In-app updates | New release? The app downloads the right installer for your OS and installs it with one click (signed, verified). |
Hoard snapshots your saves every time you stop playing, hashes every file, and lets you roll back to any earlier version or pull your whole library onto a fresh machine. Nothing is ever silently overwritten — that's the entire point.
Works in any plataform -- except phone, you can install in: hoard.services/download:
If you are in gamemode in steamos/brazzite/cachyos you can use Hoard-CLI
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Hoard is an engine (hoardd) plus two faces: the terminal (hoard) and the
app. The installer works out which ones your machine wants and puts them all in
at the same version — a NAS or a server stops at the engine and the terminal, a
desktop or a Steam Deck gets the app too, in the same pass. Upgrades move
everything together, so the pieces can't drift apart.
In game mode there is nothing to keep open: the engine runs as a background service that starts with your session, so your saves sync with no window and no terminal.
Prefer the terminal, or running on a headless box (NAS / server / Steam Deck)?
Add --headless and it never fetches the app. Everything ships as standalone
binaries with no GUI deps.
Download it in cli latest release:
If web not open:
Linux:
curl -fsSL https://hoard.services/install.sh | sh
Windows:
irm https://hoard.services/install.ps1 | iex
- Self-hosting guide — Docker, bare-metal + systemd, and the headless CLI.
- Contributing — building from source, the release flow, and the architecture.
- Funding — where the money goes and what your sponsorship covers.
Hoard is free and open-source. Your support helps cover server costs and funds development.