Trello Backup Bot — Export Trello Boards, Cards & Checklists to JSON

Back up any Trello board in one run. Paste a board URL and get every card as a clean JSON/CSV row — with its list, labels, members, due dates, checklists and attachments already resolved to readable names — plus an optional full raw board snapshot saved as a downloadable backup file.

• Public boards need zero setup — no Trello account, no API key, nothing to install.
• Private boards work too: paste your free Trello API key + token (30-second setup, instructions in the input form; stored encrypted).
• Trello's own export is Atlassian-gated and gives you one giant raw JSON blob. This Actor gives you both: the raw snapshot and tidy per-card rows you can open in Excel, load into a database, or feed to another tool.

What data you get

One row per card:

Field	Description
boardName, boardUrl, boardId	The board the card belongs to
listName, listId, listArchived	The column the card sits in
name, description	Card title and full Markdown description
labels	Label names (or colors when unnamed) — empty when the card has no labels
members	Full names of assigned members
due, dueComplete, start	Dates and completion state — null when the card has no due date set
checklists	Every checklist with each item's name and complete/incomplete state
attachments	Name + URL of every attachment
commentCount, dateLastActivity	Activity signals
archived, position, url, cardId	Card state, ordering and permalink

Plus one summary row per board (counts of cards, lists, labels, members, checklists, and the key of the raw backup file), and — when saveFullJson is on (default) — the complete untouched board JSON in the run's key-value store as board-<shortlink>.json.

Input example

{
    "boards": ["https://trello.com/b/nC8QJJoZ/trello-development"],
    "includeArchived": false,
    "saveFullJson": true
}

boards accepts full URLs, short links (nC8QJJoZ) or 24-character board IDs — and you can back up many boards in one run. For private boards, also fill in apiKey and apiToken.

Output sample (real run)

{
  "type": "card",
  "boardName": "Trello Development Roadmap",
  "boardUrl": "https://trello.com/b/nC8QJJoZ",
  "listName": "Live (Jan-March 2021)",
  "name": "More Butler Automation Types For All!",
  "description": "",
  "archived": false,
  "due": null,
  "dueComplete": null,
  "labels": [],
  "members": [],
  "checklists": [],
  "attachments": [
    {
      "name": "image.png",
      "url": "https://trello.com/1/cards/60141421ca6a79294c060174/attachments/601414679f7df478eee3c95f/download/image.png"
    }
  ],
  "commentCount": 0,
  "dateLastActivity": "2021-01-29T13:58:14.500Z",
  "url": "https://trello.com/c/lny8eJ0c"
}

And the per-board summary row:

{
  "type": "board",
  "boardName": "Trello Development Roadmap",
  "cardsExported": 174,
  "cardsOnBoard": 188,
  "listCount": 75,
  "labelCount": 8,
  "memberCount": 13,
  "fullJsonBackupKey": "board-nC8QJJoZ.json"
}

Use cases

• Scheduled backups — run it daily/weekly on a schedule and keep restore-grade snapshots of your team's boards outside Trello, safe from accidental deletions and plan downgrades.
• Migration & reporting — export cards to CSV/Excel/JSON to move into Notion, Jira, Airtable or a data warehouse, or to build progress reports across boards.
• Archiving finished projects — snapshot a project board once before closing it, then archive or delete it in Trello without losing anything.

FAQ

Do I need a Trello account or API key? Not for public boards. For private boards you need a free Trello API key + token — the input form explains the 30-second setup (create a Power-Up at trello.com/power-ups/admin, copy the key, generate a token). Both fields are stored encrypted and only ever sent to Trello.

Does it modify my boards? No. The Actor is strictly read-only — it never writes, moves or deletes anything in Trello.

Are archived cards included? Only if you enable includeArchived. Archived cards and cards in archived lists are then included and marked archived: true.

How do I restore from the backup? The board-<shortlink>.json file in the key-value store is the complete board export — the same shape Trello itself produces — so it works with the usual Trello import/restore tooling and scripts, and it preserves fields the per-card rows summarize.

How much does it cost? You pay a tiny fee per exported row ($0.001 per card/board-summary row). A 200-card board costs about $0.20 per backup. Failed or inaccessible boards are never charged.

What about Trello rate limits? One board = one API call, with automatic backoff and retries on rate-limit responses — even backing up dozens of boards stays comfortably within Trello's limits.