Unable to create a thick provisioned disk on NFS datastores via vSphere UI

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

Unable to create a thick provisioned disk on NFS datastores, the option to create a thick disk is not visible from the vCenter UI client.

Environment

VMware vSphere 7.x

VMware vSphere 8.x

Cause

run below cmd to verify if "Hardware Acceleration" is supported 

[root@esxhost:~] esxcli storage nfs list

Volume Name  Host         Share       Vmknic  Accessible  Mounted  Connections  Read-Only  isPE  Hardware Acceleration
-----------  -----------  ----------  ------  ----------  -------  -----------  ---------  -----  ---------------------
TEST_1       17*.3*.3*.*    /TEST_1        None     true         true           1       false                     false          Not Supported
TEST_123     17*.3*.3*.*   /TEST_123   None     ture         true           1       false                     false          Not Supported

If "Hardware Acceleration" is in "Not Supported" state we cannot create thick disk on NFS datastore

• On most NFS servers, the default virtual disk format is thin.
• Thick-provisioned virtual disk on an NFS datastore can be created if NFS storage array supports thick provisioning through vSphere APIs for Array Integration (VAAI).
• The ability to create a thick-provisioned disk depends on whether the VAAI plug-in is installed on ESXi host and on vendor-specific implementation of the plug-in.
• If an attempt is made to create a thick-provisioned disk on the NFS datastore that does not support thick provisioning, the disk is created in thin format.

Resolution

For information about support of thick provisioning on your NFS storage, contact your storage vendor.

 

To identify the if VAAI plugin is installed on the host 

 

• SSH to the esxi host 
• run 'esxcli software vib list'  and look for the storage vendor specific nas plugin

Additional Information

If NFS plugin is already installed on host with latest compatible according to HCL and still not reserving vm disk as thick then next step is to engage with storage vendor to investigate to further.