Time Machine or iCloud?

[vbctv]

I was with my friend the other day at the Apple Store and the Apple lady told him as long as his files were backed up to iCloud, he didn't have to worry about Time Machine any longer.
So that got me thinking, all my files are in iCloud so should I discontinue Time Machine use now?
So I decided to ask the users here what their preference is about the situation. Do you use Time Machine for backup or just store everything in your Desktop/Documents folder and keep it backed up to iCloud?

I currently do both personally, I have an SSD serving as my Time Machine (super-fast btw with SSD) and have all my stuff in the Desktop/Documents folders or other iCloud Drive folders that I have created.
But is both overkill, should we just use iCloud, it seems some employees at Apple Store think-so.

 

[Weaselboy]

I think that is really bad advice from the Apple Store employee. I view iCloud as more of a sync service and not a backup service. Using both like you are doing is the smart move.

Many of us use multiple backups just to be safe. I have iCloud Documents turned on, a Time Machine backup, a Carbon Copy Cloner clone weekly or so, and my entire Users folder backed up online using the app Arq.

 

[willmtaylor]

iCloud only backs up certain things—not everything, but it would make sense that an Apple employee would encourage further use of it, as it would push more customers to pay more monthly fees to Apple (for larger storage tiers).

I use both plus an offsite back up once a month.

 

[Fishrrman]

Neither.
Use either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper to create bootable cloned backups.

CCC also has a "safety net" feature which mimics tm's keeping older copies of files around.

 

[vbctv]

Apparently Apple does consider iCloud as a Mac backup...

How to back up your Mac - Official Apple Support

Learn more about all of the ways you can backup your Mac computer. Backing up your Mac is simple, important and recommended for everyone.

support.apple.com

I believe it used to only show Time Machine on that page. Makes me wonder if Apple employees are pushing iCloud because maybe Apple plans to do away with Time Machine one day, the fact that it still doesn't support APFS & has to be formatted as HFS+ is still beyond me.
But for no I will continue to do both Time Machine & iCloud. I just leave my Time Machine plugged into my Mac mini.