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ONTAP tools for VMware vSphere 10

Delete datastores

Contributors netapp-jani
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This page describes how to delete NFS, VMFS, or vVols datastores using ONTAP tools in the vCenter Server.

When you delete a datastore, the following actions are performed depending on the datastore type:

  • The vVol container is unmounted.

  • If the igroup is not in use, iqn is removed from the igroup.

  • The vVol container is deleted.

  • Flex volumes are left on the storage array.

You can delete the datastore only if no vVols are present on the selected datastore.

Steps

  1. Log in to the vSphere client.

  2. Right-click on a host system, a host cluster, or a data center and select NetApp ONTAP tools > Delete datastore.

    Note You cannot delete a datastore used by virtual machines. Move virtual machines to another datastore before deleting. You cannot delete the volume if it is part of a protected host cluster.

    1. In the case of an NFS or VMFS datastore, a dialog box appears with the list of VMs using the datastore.

    2. If no virtual machines are associated with a VMFS datastore, you see a confirmation dialog. If host cluster protection is enabled and an AFD relationship exists, you can clean up secondary storage elements.

    3. For protected VMFS datastores on ASA r2 systems, remove protection before deleting. Beginning with ONTAP 9.17.1 and ONTAP tools for VMware vSphere 10.5, you can delete a protected datastore. If it is the only datastore in the protection group, host cluster protection removes automatically.

    4. For vVols datastores, you can delete the datastore only if there are no vVols present. The Delete datastore dialog box includes an option to remove volumes from the ONTAP cluster.

    5. For vVols datastores on ASA r2 systems, you cannot delete the backing volumes from ONTAP using the Delete datastore option.

  3. To delete the backing volumes on ONTAP storage, select Delete volumes on ONTAP cluster.

    Note For VMFS datastores on unified ONTAP storage that are part of a protected host cluster, you cannot delete the volume from the ONTAP cluster.

When you delete an NFS, VMFS, or vVols datastore, parent igroups remain on the ONTAP system. Child igroups that are not mapped to any LUNs are deleted automatically. ONTAP tools perform a daily cleanup to remove unmapped default parent igroups. Delete the custom parent igroups manually in ONTAP. ONTAP tools cannot reuse stale parent igroups.