This page describes how to make backup copies of your pod-based indexes using collections. To learn how to create a pod-based index from a collection, see Create indexes.
Serverless and starter indexes do not support collections.

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Create a backup using a collection

To create a backup of your pod-based index, use the create_collection operation. A collection is a static copy of your index that only consumes storage. Example The following example creates a collection named example-collection from an index named example-index. 
from pinecone import Pinecone

pc = Pinecone(api_key='API_KEY')
pc.create_collection("example-collection", "example-index")

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Check the status of a collection

To retrieve the status of the process creating a collection and the size of the collection, use the describe_collection operation. Specify the name of the collection to check. You can only call describe_collection on a collection in the current project. The describe_collection operation returns an object containing key-value pairs representing the name of the collection, the size in bytes, and the creation status of the collection. Example The following example gets the creation status and size of a collection named example-collection. 
from pinecone import Pinecone

pc = Pinecone(api_key='API_KEY')
pc.describe_collection("example-collection")

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List your collections

To get a list of the collections in the current project, use the list_collections operation. Example The following example gets a list of all collections in the current project. 
from pinecone import Pinecone

pc = Pinecone(api_key='API_KEY')
pc.list_collections()

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Delete a collection

To delete a collection, use the delete_collection operation. Specify the name of the collection to delete. Deleting the collection takes several minutes. During this time, the describe_collection operation returns the status "deleting". Example The following example deletes the collection example-collection. 
from pinecone import Pinecone

pc = Pinecone(api_key='API_KEY')
pc.delete_collection("example-collection")