Unable to remove dead vSAN datastore references and cluster in vCenter

Products

• VMware vSAN

Issue/Introduction

After decommissioning a vSAN cluster (uninstalling vSAN from hosts and moving them to a new cluster), a "ghost" or "zombie" vSAN datastore object remains in the original Cluster object.

• Cannot Delete Cluster: Attempts to delete the original Cluster object fail because vCenter detects it still contains a datastore (the dead vSAN datastore).
• Cannot Remove Datastore: The vSAN datastore cannot be unmounted or removed via the vSphere Client UI.
• Empty Cluster: The cluster itself contains no hosts or VMs, but the datastore object persists.
• HCI Mesh Residue: In some configurations, the datastore may still appear mounted in other clusters if HCI Mesh was utilized.

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 8.x

Cause

The issue is caused by stale references in the vCenter Database (VCDB). Even though vSAN has been disabled on the ESXi hosts and the hosts have been moved or formatted, the vCenter inventory database retains a record of the vSAN datastore object. Because vCenter believes the datastore exists within the cluster, it prevents the deletion of the cluster object to maintain referential integrity.

Note: This issue typically occurs after manually dismantling a vSAN cluster without fully decommissioning the datastore object first.

Resolution

Since the datastore object does not exist on any physical hosts, the stale reference must be removed directly from the vCenter Database.

Verify Host Status: Ensure all hosts have been removed from the cluster or have vSAN completely disabled.

• Run esxcli vsan cluster get and esxcli vsan datastore list on the hosts to confirm they are not participating in the vSAN cluster.

As this resolution requires direct modification of the vCenter Database (VCDB) to purge the specific "zombie" entity rows, please open a support request with Broadcom Support.

Additional Information

To prevent this in future decommission scenarios, ensure the vSAN datastore is fully destroyed/unmounted while the hosts are still in the cluster and before the cluster object is emptied. Follow the standard "Decommission vSAN Cluster" procedures which include removing the disk groups and disabling vSAN on the cluster object level first.