Unable to expand a virtual machine's hard disk

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

• When attempting to expand a virtual machine's hard disk in the "Edit Settings" screen, the hard disk size is grayed out and expansion is not possible.

• If you expand the hard disk item whose size is grayed out, you will see that the snapshot file is listed as a "Disk File".

  Example of a display if a snapshot file is listed as a "Disk File":
  [DatastoreName]VirtualMachineName/VirtualMachineName-000001.vmdk

  Example of a display if a snapshot file is not listed as a "Disk File":
  [DatastoreName]VirtualMachineName/VirtualMachineName.vmdk

Environment

vSphere 8.0

Cause

If snapshots exist for the target virtual machine, you cannot change the virtual machine's hard disk size.

Resolution

Delete all snapshots for the target virtual machine before expanding the hard disk.
For instructions on deleting snapshots, refer to the document below.

Delete a Snapshot

If no snapshots are displayed on the "Snapshot Management" screen and the following message appears in the "Issues and Alarms" section of the "Summary," consolidate the snapshots.

Virtual machine consolidation needed status

For instructions on consolidating snapshots, refer to the following document.

Consolidate Snapshots

Additional Information

For more information on deleting/consolidating snapshots, see KB 371714 below.

FAQ: Delete all Snapshots and Consolidate Snapshots Feature