manstorageReviewed March 6, 2026
Storage pools and backends
Libvirt pools abstract where guest disks live. The pool type tells you which backend owns the bytes and which operational failure modes to expect. Common pool types | Type | What it maps to | Operational note | | | | | |
storage pooldirlvmnfsiscsi
Libvirt pools abstract where guest disks live. The pool type tells you which backend owns the bytes and which operational failure modes to expect.
Common pool types
| Type | What it maps to | Operational note |
|---|---|---|
dir | A filesystem directory | Simplest to inspect and back up |
logical | LVM volume group | Fast and common for dense local hosts |
netfs | NFS export | Shared storage with external network dependency |
iscsi | iSCSI target | Block storage with network path and initiator state |
Pool lifecycle
BASH
virsh pool-list --all
virsh pool-info fast-lvm
virsh pool-dumpxml fast-lvm
virsh vol-list fast-lvmWhat to read first
- For
dir, inspect the directory path, ownership, and mount state. - For LVM, inspect the volume group and free extents.
- For NFS, confirm the mount is live before blaming libvirt.
- For iSCSI, verify the session and device visibility on the host.
Safety checks
Never assume a pool that is defined is also started, mounted, or healthy.