VMware guest file restore requirements in NetApp Backup and Recovery

08/19/2026 Contributors

Use guest file restore to restore files or folders from a virtual machine disk (VMDK) on a Windows or Linux guest OS.

Guest file restore workflow

Guest file restore includes the following steps:

Attach

Attach a virtual disk to a guest VM or proxy VM and start a guest file restore session.
Wait

Wait for the attach operation to complete before you can browse and restore. When the attach operation finishes, a guest file restore session is automatically created.
Select files or folders

Browse or search the virtual disk files and select one or more files or folders to restore.
Restore

Restore the selected files or folders to a specified location.

Review all requirements before restoring files or folders from a VMDK.

VMware Tools must be installed and running.

NetApp Backup and Recovery uses information from VMware Tools to establish a connection to the VMware guest OS.
You must know the backup snapshot and VMDK to restore from.
The virtual disk that you attach must be in a NetApp Backup and Recovery backup.

The virtual disk that contains the file or folder you want to restore must be in a VM backup that was performed using NetApp Backup and Recovery.
To use a proxy VM, the proxy VM must be configured.

If you want to attach a virtual disk to a proxy VM, the proxy VM must be configured before the attach and restore operation begins.
For files with non-English character names, you must restore them in a directory, not as a single file.

You can restore files with non-English characters, such as Japanese Kanji, by restoring the directory in which the files are located.

For the latest information on guest OS support, refer to the NetApp Interoperability Matrix Tool (IMT).

The Windows guest OS must be running Windows Server 2008 R2 or later.

For the latest information about supported versions, refer to NetApp Interoperability Matrix Tool (IMT).
Credentials for the target VM use the built-in domain or local administrator account with the username "Administrator". Before starting the restore operation, configure the credentials for the VM where you want to attach the virtual disk. Credentials are required for both attach and restore operations. Workgroup users can use the built-in local administrator account.

If you must use an account that is not the built-in administrator account, but has administrative privileges within the VM, you must disable UAC on the guest VM.

The following guest OS distributions are supported:
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux
- Ubuntu
- Debian
The Run-As account needs root or sudo permissions.
For cross-VM restore (restoring to a different Linux VM), SSH must be running on the target VM.

Before you restore a file or folder from a guest OS, review these limitations.

You cannot restore dynamic disk types inside a guest OS.
If you restore an encrypted file or folder, the encryption attribute is not retained.
You cannot restore files or folders to an encrypted folder.
Hidden files and folders are displayed in the file browse page, and you cannot filter them.
You cannot restore files or folders between guests with different operating systems (when restoring to a different VM, the destination OS type must be the same as the source OS type).
You cannot restore from an NTFS file system to a FAT file system.

When you try to restore from NTFS-format to FAT-format, the NTFS security descriptor is not copied because the FAT file system does not support Windows security attributes.
You cannot restore guest files from a cloned VMDK or an uninitialized VMDK.
You cannot restore the directory structure for a file.

When you restore a file from a nested directory, the system restores only the file, not its directory structure. To restore the entire directory tree, copy the top-level directory.
You cannot restore guest files from a vVol VM to an alternate host.
You cannot restore encrypted guest files.