topic Re: Can't shrink a volume that is 7 TB bigger than the LUN that's on it in ONTAP Discussions

Can't shrink a volume that is 7 TB bigger than the LUN that's on it

wsanderstii — Wed, 04 Jun 2025 18:41:29 GMT

We have come up against the 16TB size lmit for a LUN in Ontap 8.3.1. The LUN is on a volume that has been grown to 23.04 TB, yet the LUN is only 16 TB. There are no other LUNs on the volume, yet the vol is 100% full. What is using this extra space on the volume? What is "Reserved Space for Overwrites" and why is it 6.45TB?

There are no snapshots on the volume and a 5% snapshot reserve.

How can we reclaim this 7+TB of space on the volume?

lun show:

/vol/VMDK_01/VMDK_01            online  mapped   vmware    15.97TB

vol show:

VMDK_01 netapp_clr301_01_aggr1
    online RW 23.04TB 0B 100%

vol show detail:

netapp-clr301::> vol show -vserver netapp-iscsi301 -volume VMDK_01

                                   Vserver Name: netapp-iscsi301
                                    Volume Name: VMDK_01
                                 Aggregate Name: netapp_clr301_01_aggr1
                                    Volume Size: 23.04TB
                             Volume Data Set ID: 1100
                      Volume Master Data Set ID: 2147484748
                                   Volume State: online
                                    Volume Type: RW
                                   Volume Style: flex
                         Is Cluster-Mode Volume: true
                          Is Constituent Volume: false
                                  Export Policy: default
                                        User ID: 0
                                       Group ID: 0
                                 Security Style: unix
                               UNIX Permissions: ---rwxr-xr-x
                                  Junction Path: -
                           Junction Path Source: -
                                Junction Active: -
                         Junction Parent Volume: -
                                        Comment:
                                 Available Size: 0B
                                Filesystem Size: 23.04TB
                        Total User-Visible Size: 21.89TB
                                      Used Size: 21.89TB
                                Used Percentage: 100%
           Volume Nearly Full Threshold Percent: 95%
                  Volume Full Threshold Percent: 98%
           Maximum Autosize (for flexvols only): 30TB
(DEPRECATED)-Autosize Increment (for flexvols only): 1GB
                               Minimum Autosize: 23.04TB
             Autosize Grow Threshold Percentage: 98%
           Autosize Shrink Threshold Percentage: 50%
                                  Autosize Mode: off
           Autosize Enabled (for flexvols only): false
            Total Files (for user-visible data): 31876689
             Files Used (for user-visible data): 101
                          Space Guarantee Style: volume
                      Space Guarantee in Effect: true
              Snapshot Directory Access Enabled: true
             Space Reserved for Snapshot Copies: 5%
                          Snapshot Reserve Used: 0%
                                Snapshot Policy: none
                                  Creation Time: Fri May 20 14:22:19 2016
                                       Language: C.UTF-8
                                   Clone Volume: false
                                      Node name: netapp-clr301-01
                                  NVFAIL Option: on
                          Volume's NVFAIL State: false
        Force NVFAIL on MetroCluster Switchover: off
                      Is File System Size Fixed: false
                                  Extent Option: off
                  Reserved Space for Overwrites: 6.45TB
                             Fractional Reserve: 100%
              Primary Space Management Strategy: volume_grow
                       Read Reallocation Option: off
               Inconsistency in the File System: false
                   Is Volume Quiesced (On-Disk): false
                 Is Volume Quiesced (In-Memory): false
      Volume Contains Shared or Compressed Data: true
              Space Saved by Storage Efficiency: 660.4GB
         Percentage Saved by Storage Efficiency: 3%
                   Space Saved by Deduplication: 660.4GB
              Percentage Saved by Deduplication: 3%
                  Space Shared by Deduplication: 72.02GB
                     Space Saved by Compression: 0B
          Percentage Space Saved by Compression: 0%
            Volume Size Used by Snapshot Copies: 0B
                                     Block Type: 64-bit
                               Is Volume Moving: false
                 Flash Pool Caching Eligibility: read-write
  Flash Pool Write Caching Ineligibility Reason: -
                     Managed By Storage Service: -
Create Namespace Mirror Constituents For SnapDiff Use: -
                        Constituent Volume Role: -
                          QoS Policy Group Name: -
                            Caching Policy Name: -
                Is Volume Move in Cutover Phase: false
        Number of Snapshot Copies in the Volume: 0
VBN_BAD may be present in the active filesystem: false
                Is Volume on a hybrid aggregate: false
                       Total Physical Used Size: 5.87TB
                       Physical Used Percentage: 25%

Re: Can't shrink a volume that is 7 TB bigger than the LUN that's on it

aborzenkov — Wed, 12 Oct 2016 06:45:39 GMT

@wsanderstii wrote:
There are no snapshots on the volume

You have deduplication enabled and deduplication internally works with snapshots

@wsanderstii wrote:

netapp-clr301::> vol show -vserver netapp-iscsi301 -volume VMDK_01
...
                  Reserved Space for Overwrites: 6.45TB
                             Fractional Reserve: 100%
...

Set fractional reserve to 0, this should free reserved space. Please note, this may result in out of space condition during writes to LUN.

Re: Can't shrink a volume that is 7 TB bigger than the LUN that's on it

wsanderstii — Wed, 12 Oct 2016 18:28:36 GMT

Yes, after setting factional reserve to 0 the space was immediately freed up. I guess after working with netapps for 20+ years I still don't understand factional reserve. Perhaps no one does 🙂

The unanswered question is why the factional reserve claimed 23+ TB for the volume when it only has one LUN on it, reservation is *on* for the LUN, so the vol should only need 16TB for the LUN plus some space (6+ TB?!?) for metadata and deduplication. (The LUN is 99% full but reservation should make that irrelevant.) "vol show-footprint" and "vol show-space" didn't hint at that.

I am still mystified why "show footprint" showed this

netapp-clr301::> vol show-footprint -volume VMDK_01

      Vserver : netapp-iscsi301
      Volume  : VMDK_01

      Feature                                   Used    Used%
      --------------------------------    ----------    -----
      Volume Data Footprint                   5.88TB      10%
      Volume Guarantee                       16.93TB      30%
      Flexible Volume Metadata               131.1GB       0%
      Deduplication                              8KB       0%
      Delayed Frees                          235.9GB       0%

      Total Footprint                        23.17TB      41%

when the 99% full 16TB LUN on the volume, with reservation on, is the only thing on the volume.

Re: Can't shrink a volume that is 7 TB bigger than the LUN that's on it

aborzenkov — Thu, 13 Oct 2016 06:12:02 GMT

@wsanderstii wrote:
I guess after working with netapps for 20+ years I still don't understand factional reserve. Perhaps no one does 🙂

LUN space management (including fractional reserve) is described pretty extensively in TR-3483. I am surpsised you never came around to reading it in 20+ years. If I am mistaken and you did - do you have specific question about content of this TR?

Re: Can't shrink a volume that is 7 TB bigger than the LUN that's on it

wsanderstii — Thu, 13 Oct 2016 16:25:40 GMT

Thanks- that was a failed attempt at humor. I can say I don't recall ever deliberately turning fractional reserve on on ever. There are only a few use cases in TR-3483 where its use is mentioned.