---
title: "VMWare: Recovering from running out of disk space on the Host machine"
description: Recovering from disk space issues on a VMware host machine involves manually killing VM processes and restarting them to get back to normal operations.
---

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# [VMWare: Recovering from running out of disk space on the Host machine](https://www.metaltoad.com/blog/vmware-recovering-running-out-disk-space-host-machine)

 Written by [Joaquin Lippincott, CEO](https://www.metaltoad.com/blog/author/joaquin-lippincott-ceo) | Jan 19, 2009 12:00:00 AM

If you've ever run out of disk space you know what a pain that is. However when you run out of diskspace on the host machine running VMware, things get even more interesting.

When disk space runs out on the Host VMs are plunged into a “stuck” state, which means they cannot be restarted or started normally. Generally the best way to manage the state of the server is to:

1. Get a list of VMs:  
`# vmware-cmd -l`

2. Check the state:

`# vmware-cmd "path-to-the-vm.vmx" getstate`

If this second command returns `getstate() = stuck`, grab a cup of coffee and know this will take a little while to fix. At this point, you’ll need to kill all the VM processes manually:

1. Find out the ids for the processes:

`# ps -ef | grep vm`

2. Kill the process based on the id returned:

`# kill idgoeshere`

Repeat for all the VMs that are stuck. This puts the VM in stopped mode. You can verify this by getting the VM state (above). To start the VM, run the following:

`# vmware-cmd "path-to-the-vm.vmx" start`

This should get your VM back up and running. Keep in mind this actually restarts the machine. In my experience it takes a few minutes to get the machine to respond to anything (ping, ssh, etc) and if you have any services that are not set to start on boot up you will have to do that manually.

[View full post](https://www.metaltoad.com/blog/vmware-recovering-running-out-disk-space-host-machine)

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