Moodle Best Practices


Use the “Copy Course” Functionality from Site Administration
Administrators can copy courses from Site administration → Courses → Manage courses and categories without including user data.


  • Select a category from the left panel

  • All courses in that category will appear on the right

  • This method allows administrators to copy courses without entering each course individually

  • This approach is faster and more efficient for bulk administrative work

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Copy Only Selected Sections or Activities
Instead of copying the entire course when backing up and restoring a course using Course reuse, select only the required sections or activities.


  • This significantly reduces the amount of data being backed up and restored

  • Results in faster processing times and lower server load

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Improve Server Performance
Apply changes that help prevent timeouts during backup and restore processes. Ensure the server configuration supports course copying by:


  • Increasing memory_limit

  • Increasing max_execution_time

Schedule Copies During Off-Peak Hours

  • Perform course copying during low-usage periods

  • Moodle runs backup and restore operations as background tasks


Troubleshooting Backup Stalling Above 90%
If a course backup stops at more than 90% without displaying any errors, the most likely causes are:


  • The course uses a non-standard course format. Check and change the course format if necessary. Refer to the standard course formats in Moodle: Course Formats

  • Insufficient server RAM. Increasing server RAM is one of the primary performance recommendations for Moodle