Integrate AWS S3 bucket with VMware ESXi host as a datastore

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

How to use Amazon AWS S3 bucket as a datastore to mount directly to the ESXi host.

Environment

VMware vSphere ESXi 7.0.x

VMware vSphere ESXi 8.0.x

Resolution

ESXi does not natively support using an AWS S3 bucket as a datastore. However, you can integrate an AWS S3 bucket by deploying an AWS Storage Gateway, which presents the S3 bucket in a supported format such as NFS that ESXi can mount as a datastore.

For setup and configuration, it’s recommended to engage the vendor for assistance with Amazon S3 File Gateway.

Below are some articles for reference :

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/filegateway/latest/files3/what-is-file-s3.html

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/pdfs/filegateway/latest/files3/storagegateway-s3file-ug.pdf#what-is-file-s3