Acronis True Image is available for macOS and Windows on the desktop side, and Android and iOS on the mobile side (Linux isn’t supported). I tested the Windows and iOS versions.
The Windows installer is large (approximately 1GB) and doesn’t let you start the program until you register for an Acronis user account. The app features a spacious and user-friendly interface, complete with seven flat tabs along the left rail. There are also large, clearly labeled buttons for various tasks. Despite its many tools, Acronis True Image is one of the most visually attractive backup services I’ve tested.
(Credit: Acronis/PCMag)
The app displays two big icons when you create a backup, one for the source and one for the destination. To change the source, you simply mouse over its icon, click it, and pick a new one. The source can be the entire PC, individual disks or partitions, or files and folders. The destination can be another PC, an external USB drive, or a NAS drive. Acronis gives you lots of freedom in that regard.
You can also set up a backup from a mobile device, Microsoft OneDrive, or Outlook. That said, you may need to consult Acronis’ online help for instructions on how to do so. You see, True Image displayed an “Open Online Dashboard” message when I tried to create a OneDrive backup. However, the dashboard didn’t launch in the Resource tab, where I needed to click the “Add” button to create the OneDrive backup in the first place. I had to visit Acronis’ help files to find the button. Annoying. After setting up my backups, however, it was a breeze to create a backup schedule, encrypt the backups, and determine how long to keep older backups.
As in previous versions, True Image doesn’t inspire confidence in Acronis’ testing and quality control. For example, if you click the Info icon on any of the 10 Tools menu buttons, you’ll see information on only one of the tools—the one that creates a bootable rescue disk. If you go to the About screen on the Help tab, you won’t see the app’s version number. Instead, under “Version,” it displays “%4, Build %3.” Likewise, a link to customer support displays “%1.” How certain are you that you want to trust your precious data to an app that can’t even get its version number right?
Meanwhile, some menus aren’t as clear as others. For example, the Clone Disk Wizard (which lets you make a copy of your entire PC) employs a different visual style than True Image’s attractive main menu, with cramped and uninformative dialog boxes.
Previous True Image versions linked to third-party tools that required payment and had no connection to the backup process. The current version, thankfully, only links to integrated apps and a few free, specialist-level tools created by Acronis users. The most useful ones include software for creating a custom emergency boot disk usable on tablets and a convenient log viewer for troubleshooting problems.
