--- title: How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours... description: GitLab engineers identified and fixed a critical performance bottleneck in Git's bundle creation process that was causing repository backups to take up to 48... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/how-we-decreased-gitlab-repo-backup-times-from-48-hours-to-41-minutes-phjqnryqb twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes | daily.dev og:description: GitLab engineers identified and fixed a critical performance bottleneck in Git's bundle creation process that was causing repository backups to take up to 48... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/how-we-decreased-gitlab-repo-backup-times-from-48-hours-to-41-minutes-phjqnryqb og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/PhjQNRyQB.png og:image:alt: How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes **[GitLab](https://daily.dev/sources/gitlab)** · 7 min read · 3 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary GitLab engineers identified and fixed a critical performance bottleneck in Git's bundle creation process that was causing repository backups to take up to 48 hours. The issue stemmed from a 15-year-old Git function with O(N²) complexity that became problematic for repositories with large numbers of references. By replacing nested loops with a map data structure, they achieved a 6x performance improvement, reducing their largest repository backup time from 48 hours to just 41 minutes. The fix was contributed upstream to Git and is available to all GitLab customers starting with version 18.0, enabling more frequent backups and better disaster recovery strategies. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: --- Tags: [#performance](https://daily.dev/tags/performance), [#git](https://daily.dev/tags/git), [#gitlab](https://daily.dev/tags/gitlab) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/how-we-decreased-gitlab-repo-backup-times-from-48-hours-to-41-minutes-phjqnryqb) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/how-we-decreased-gitlab-repo-backup-times-from-48-hours-to-41-minutes-phjqnryqb","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/how-we-decreased-gitlab-repo-backup-times-from-48-hours-to-41-minutes-phjqnryqb"},"datePublished":"2025-06-05T10:39:12.541Z","dateModified":"2025-06-05T10:39:36.013Z","description":"GitLab engineers identified and fixed a critical performance bottleneck in Git's bundle creation process that was causing repository backups to take up to 48...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/69e94d7f86dbe3a28a3473ba7e43fe61?_a=AQAEulh","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/69e94d7f86dbe3a28a3473ba7e43fe61?_a=AQAEulh","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"GitLab","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"GitLab","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/3720ce340ca4435daef529abbf361b69","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/gitlab"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/how-we-decreased-gitlab-repo-backup-times-from-48-hours-to-41-minutes-phjqnryqb","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":3},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"performance,git,gitlab","timeRequired":"PT7M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"GitLab","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/gitlab"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"How we decreased GitLab repo backup times from 48 hours to 41 minutes"}]} ```