Deciding whether to use the Volume Move Express Guide

You can use this guide to nondisruptively move a data volume from one node to another node within the same storage virtual machine (SVM) in an ONTAP 9 cluster.

Requirements for using this guide

Before you use this guide, ensure that the following conditions are met:

The cluster is running ONTAP 9.
You have cluster administrator privileges.
You want to use best practices, not explore every available option.
You do not want to read a lot of conceptual background.
You want to use System Manager.
For some tasks, you must use the ONTAP command-line interface (CLI).
You want to use the legacy OnCommand System Manager UI for ONTAP 9.7 and earlier releases, not the ONTAP System Manager UI for ONTAP 9.7 and later.
ONTAP System Manager documentation
You know which volume you want to move.
For help in deciding which volumes to move, you can use Active IQ Unified Manager (formerly OnCommand Unified Manager).
The volume that will be moved is a data volume.
Any new or repurposed hardware is fully installed and already has aggregates.
If the cluster has LUNs, all nodes have two paths per LUN.
Flow control is not enabled on cluster network ports.
For volumes containing namespaces, the cluster is running ONTAP 9.6 or later.
Volume move is not supported for NVMe configurations running ONTAP 9.5.

If this guide is not suitable for your situation, you should see the following documentation instead:

Logical storage management
Describes how to move volumes by using the CLI.
NetApp Documentation: OnCommand Workflow Automation (current releases)
OnCommand Workflow Automation enables you to run prepackaged workflows that automate management tasks such as the workflows described in Express Guides.

Alternatives to volume move

Before moving volumes, you should evaluate whether the following approaches are better suited to your situation:

If you want to nondisruptively upgrade a controller in place, you can consider using aggregate relocation (ARL), which does not require physical data movement.
High-availability configuration
If you want to move only a LUN—without its containing volume—you can use the LUN move mechanism.
SAN administration