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The vault sends the original files on a source to Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive, a cold storage tier built for files you need to keep but rarely touch. The source stays in your catalog with its metadata and previews, and a Vaulted badge tells your team the originals have a copy in cold storage.

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When to use the vault

The vault is well-suited for:
  • Completed projects: footage from a finished production that you want to retain but no longer need on a local drive.
  • Offline backup copies: drives that are going into physical long-term storage and won’t be reconnected regularly.
  • Storage cost reduction: keeping a cold copy of large sources so local or NAS storage can be reused.
Deep Archive is cold storage. 1Archive can’t open, download, or restore files from the vault, so vault a source only when you won’t need its originals back soon. To get files back, contact 1Archive support.

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Add a source to the vault

1

Connect the drive

Plug in the drive and make sure 1Archive shows it as connected. You also need an internet connection, because 1Archive reads each original file off the drive as it uploads.
2

Add the source to the vault

Right-click the source in the Sources sidebar, on the Sources page, or on the Dashboard, and choose Add source to vault. The upload starts right away. There’s no confirmation step, so check that you picked the right drive.
Vaulting is for Owners, Admins, and Editors with edit access to the source. The menu item also shows for Viewers, but their uploads never mark the source Vaulted, so ask someone with edit access to do it. Google Drive sources can’t be vaulted.
Keep the drive connected until the upload finishes. If it disconnects, the files that haven’t uploaded yet fail with Error and don’t resume on their own. Reconnect the drive and choose Add source to vault again. 1Archive skips files already in the vault and uploads the rest.

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Monitor the upload

Open Transfers in the left rail to watch the upload. The badge on Transfers counts files still in flight. Each source gets its own group with the finished count, upload speed, and a progress bar. Files in flight show one of these statuses:
  • Pending: waiting to upload, or waiting to retry after a network hiccup.
  • In Progress: uploading now.
  • Error: the upload failed. The reason appears in red under the file name.
Finished files drop off the list, and failed ones clear after a few seconds, so keep an eye on the finished count. Click Clear on a finished group, or Clear Completed at the top of the page, to tidy up.

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Vaulted source status

When the upload finishes, the source gets a Vaulted badge on the Sources page and the Dashboard. In grid view it’s a small box icon on the drive’s corner (hover it to read Vaulted). In list view it sits next to the name. Everyone who can see the source sees it. Vaulting adds a copy and changes nothing else:
  • Metadata, thumbnails, and previews stay in the catalog and stay searchable.
  • File ratings, flags, and color tags are preserved.
  • With the drive connected, you open and export originals as usual. With it disconnected, you can browse and export previews, but originals need the drive.
If you delete the source later, its vault copies are deleted with it, except for files another source in your catalog still holds.

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Before you wipe or reuse the drive

Check Transfers for errors first. Then select a few files and open the Locations tab in the file sidebar: a vaulted file lists Amazon Glacier (Deep Archive) with a Deep archive badge. If you saw any errors, run Add source to vault once more before you take the drive out of service.