Like most people, you probably have a few different ideas about how long your first backup will take. But in reality, the time it takes to complete your first backup is usually pretty straightforward. Backing up your data to a cloud storage service like Amazon S3 or Google Drive can take only a few minutes, and most online backup services offer free trials that give you plenty of time to test out their features. So if you're just starting and don't have any particular timeframe in mind, odds are your first backup will take around 10 minutes or less.