Skip to main content

Storage ecosystem

In XCP-ng, VM disks live in a Storage Repository (SR). The XAPI storage module does all the heavy lifting: you point XCP-ng at a disk, a partition, or a network share, and it handles formatting and management for you. SRs can be thin or thick provisioned, and local or shared across a pool.

The canonical reference is the storage section of the XCP-ng documentation, which lists every SR driver and its support status.

Officially supported SR types​

  • File based: Local EXT, NFS, File, and XOSTOR (shared, thin provisioned)
  • Block based: Local LVM, iSCSI, and HBA (Fibre Channel and similar)

Additional drivers are provided as-is with less testing: ZFS, XFS, GlusterFS, CephFS, MooseFS, Ceph RBD, and more. File based, thin provisioned SRs (local EXT, NFS, XOSTOR) are the recommended choice: snapshots used by backup jobs cost far less space than on thick provisioned storage.

Any iSCSI or NFS array works out of the box​

Because NFS, iSCSI, and HBA are standard protocols, any storage vendor exposing them is compatible with XCP-ng out of the box: point XCP-ng at the share or LUN and it becomes a Storage Repository, with no vendor-specific driver, plugin, or certification needed. If your NAS or SAN speaks NFS or iSCSI, it works, whether or not its vendor appears anywhere in our documentation.

Active storage partnerships​

On top of that baseline compatibility, we maintain active partnerships with storage vendors through the Vates Alliance Network: both engineering teams work together on joint validation, documented reference configurations, and deeper integration over time.

  • LINBIT: the partnership behind XOSTOR: LINBIT's open source DRBD and LINSTOR technologies power the hyperconverged storage of XCP-ng.
  • DataCore: StarWind VSAN is certified with XCP-ng, and SANsymphony is compatible over iSCSI and FC (announcement).
  • Nexsan: the Unity series is validated over iSCSI, NFS and FC (announcement).
  • Pure Storage: Vates joined the Everpure Technology Alliance Program, with integration work on the roadmap (announcement).

XOSTOR: hyperconverged storage​

XOSTOR is Vates' hyperconverged storage solution, replicating volumes across the hosts of an XCP-ng pool: see the XOSTOR page for the full product description.

Disk formats and the 16 TiB limit​

VHD is the historical, still default, disk format, limited to 2 TiB per virtual disk. The QCOW2 format, generally available in XCP-ng 8.3 LTS, raises the limit to 16 TiB; Xen Orchestra automatically selects QCOW2 when you create a larger disk. QCOW2 works on every supported SR type except XOSTOR. See the GA announcement.