High Memory Utilization on vSphere Replication Add-on Servers

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

• This article addresses observed high memory utilization (sustained at 90%–97%) on vSphere Replication Add-on servers within a vSphere Replication environment.
• This behavior is typically observed in deployments utilizing Enhanced Replication, where the overhead of the Add-on servers does not contribute to replication efficiency and may cause performance delays during Recovery Plan execution.

Environment

VMware Live Recovery 9.2

Cause

• The vSphere Replication Add-on server component is deprecated for Enhanced Replication workflows. Starting with vSphere Replication version 9.0.3, these Add-on servers are entirely decommissioned from the architecture.
• High memory utilization on these appliances in version 9.0.2 and earlier is a known artifact of their functional requirements when configured in an Enhanced Replication environment.

Resolution

To resolve the high memory utilization and optimize the vSphere Replication environment, decommission the vSphere Replication Add-on servers.

Prerequisites:

• Ensure that you are using Enhanced Replication for your virtual machines.
• Take a snapshot of your vCenter Server (<vcenter_fqdn>) and the vSphere Replication Appliance before modifying the infrastructure.

Steps to Decommission:

1. Log in to the vSphere Client.
2. Navigate to Menu > Site Recovery.
3. Identify the registered vSphere Replication Add-on servers.
4. Power off the vSphere Replication Add-on virtual machines.
5. Unregister the virtual machines from the vCenter Server inventory:
   • Right-click the Add-on virtual machine in the inventory.
   • Select Remove from Inventory.
6. Delete the virtual machine files from the datastore if they are no longer required.
7. Verify the stability of the vSphere Replication Appliance and replication status for your protected virtual machines.

Additional Information

For further architectural verification or performance tuning of your vSphere Replication environment, consult the official vSphere Replication Documentation.
If performance degradation persists post-decommissioning, verify that your vSphere Replication Appliance meets the documented resource requirements for your specific scale and environment size.