diff --git a/Dockerfile b/Dockerfile
index f03d84dd1..931132626 100644
--- a/Dockerfile
+++ b/Dockerfile
@@ -8,3 +8,12 @@ COPY requirements.txt /app/
 RUN pip install -r requirements.txt
 COPY ./bookwyrm /app
 COPY ./celerywyrm /app
+
+# crontab
+COPY ./db_backup.sh /app
+RUN apt-get update && apt-get -y install cron
+COPY db-backups-cron /etc/cron.d/db-backups-cron
+RUN chmod 0644 /etc/cron.d/db-backups-cron
+RUN crontab /etc/cron.d/db-backups-cron
+RUN touch /var/log/cron.log
+CMD cron && tail -f /var/log/cron.log
diff --git a/db-backups-cron b/db-backups-cron
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..d42df0e20
--- /dev/null
+++ b/db-backups-cron
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+0 0 * * * /app/db_bashup.sh
diff --git a/db_backup.sh b/db_backup.sh
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..bff79f9a4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/db_backup.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+#!/bin/bash
+filename=backup__$(date +%F)
+pg_dump -U fedireads | gzip > $filename.gz