Unable to Add Esxi to Cluster – Error: “The VSAN host cannot be moved to the destination cluster: destination cluster <Cluster_Name> is Virtual SAN disabled”

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi
• VMware vSAN

Issue/Introduction

When attempting to add an ESXi host to a new cluster where vSAN is disabled, the operation fails with the following error:

Error: The vSAN host cannot be moved to the destination cluster: destination cluster is Virtual SAN disabled.

This typically occurs in the following scenarios:

• The ESXi host is brand new or was previously part of a now-decommissioned vSAN environment.
• A vSAN datastore (empty or unused) is still present on the host.

Environment

VMware vSphere 7.x
VMware vSphere 8.x

Cause

This issue occurs because stale or incomplete vSAN cluster configuration data remains on the ESXi host, even though it is no longer part of an active vSAN cluster.

Resolution

Warning: Ensure that the VSAN data on the host is decommissioned or unneeded before proceeding, this will result in data loss on the datastore

1. SSH into the ESXi Host utilizing root credentials
2. Run the following command to confirm if there is a VSAN configuration present on the host:
   
   esxcli vsan cluster get 
   
   
3. Run the following command to erase the VSAN cluster configuration:
   
   esxcli vsan cluster leave
   
   
4. Proceed to add the host into the desired cluster