vgcreate(8) — Linux manual page

NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | USAGE | OPTIONS | VARIABLES | ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES | EXAMPLES | SEE ALSO | COLOPHON

VGCREATE(8)              System Manager's Manual              VGCREATE(8)

NAME         top

       vgcreate — Create a volume group

SYNOPSIS         top

       vgcreate position_args
           [ option_args ]

DESCRIPTION         top

       vgcreate creates a new VG on block devices. If the devices were
       not previously initialized as PVs with pvcreate(8), vgcreate will
       initialize them, making them PVs. The pvcreate options for
       initializing devices are also available with vgcreate.

       When vgcreate uses an existing PV, that PV's existing values for
       metadata size, PE start, etc, are used, even if different values
       are specified in the vgcreate command.  To change these values,
       first use pvremove on the device.

USAGE         top

       vgcreate VG_new PV ...
           [ -A|--autobackup y|n ]
           [ -c|--clustered y|n ]
           [ -l|--maxlogicalvolumes Number ]
           [ -p|--maxphysicalvolumes Number ]
           [ -M|--metadatatype lvm2 ]
           [ -s|--physicalextentsize Size[m|UNIT] ]
           [ -f|--force ]
           [ -Z|--zero y|n ]
           [    --addtag Tag ]
           [    --alloc contiguous|cling|cling_by_tags|normal|anywhere|
           inherit ]
           [    --metadataprofile String ]
           [    --labelsector Number ]
           [    --metadatasize Size[m|UNIT] ]
           [    --pvmetadatacopies 0|1|2 ]
           [    --[vg]metadatacopies all|unmanaged|Number ]
           [    --reportformat basic|json ]
           [    --dataalignment Size[k|UNIT] ]
           [    --dataalignmentoffset Size[k|UNIT] ]
           [    --shared ]
           [    --systemid String ]
           [    --locktype sanlock|dlm|none ]
           [    --setautoactivation y|n ]
           [ COMMON_OPTIONS ]

       Common options for lvm:
           [ -d|--debug ]
           [ -h|--help ]
           [ -q|--quiet ]
           [ -t|--test ]
           [ -v|--verbose ]
           [ -y|--yes ]
           [    --commandprofile String ]
           [    --config String ]
           [    --devices PV ]
           [    --devicesfile String ]
           [    --driverloaded y|n ]
           [    --journal String ]
           [    --lockopt String ]
           [    --longhelp ]
           [    --nohints ]
           [    --nolocking ]
           [    --profile String ]
           [    --version ]

OPTIONS         top


       --addtag Tag
              Adds  a  tag to a PV, VG or LV. This option can be repeated
              to add multiple tags at once. See  lvm(8)  for  information
              about tags.

       --alloc contiguous|cling|cling_by_tags|normal|anywhere|inherit
              Determines  the  allocation  policy when a command needs to
              allocate Physical Extents (PEs) from the VG. Each VG and LV
              has  an  allocation  policy  which  can  be  changed   with
              vgchange/lvchange, or overridden on the command line.  nor‐
              mal applies common sense rules such as not placing parallel
              stripes  on  the same PV.  inherit applies the VG policy to
              an LV.  contiguous requires new PEs be placed  adjacent  to
              existing  PEs.   cling places new PEs on the same PV as ex‐
              isting PEs in the same stripe of the LV.  If there are suf‐
              ficient PEs for an allocation,  but  normal  does  not  use
              them,  anywhere  will  use  them even if it reduces perfor‐
              mance, e.g. by placing two stripes on the same PV.  Option‐
              al positional PV args on the command line can also be  used
              to  limit  which  PVs  the command will use for allocation.
              See lvm(8) for more information about allocation.

       -A|--autobackup y|n
              Specifies if metadata should be backed up automatically af‐
              ter a change.   Enabling  this  is  strongly  advised!  See
              vgcfgbackup(8) for more information.

       -c|--clustered y|n
              This option was specific to clvm and is now replaced by the
              --shared option with lvmlockd(8).

       --commandprofile String
              The  command profile to use for command configuration.  See
              lvm.conf(5) for more information about profiles.

       --config String
              Config settings for the command. These override lvm.conf(5)
              settings.   The  String  arg  uses  the  same   format   as
              lvm.conf(5),   or   may   use  section/field  syntax.   See
              lvm.conf(5) for more information about config.

       --dataalignment Size[k|UNIT]
              Align the start of a PV data area with a multiple  of  this
              number.   To  see the location of the first Physical Extent
              (PE) of an existing PV, use pvs -o +pe_start. In  addition,
              it  may be shifted by an alignment offset, see --dataalign‐
              mentoffset.  Also specify an appropriate PE size when  cre‐
              ating a VG.

       --dataalignmentoffset Size[k|UNIT]
              Shift the start of the PV data area by this additional off‐
              set.

       -d|--debug ...
              Set  debug  level. Repeat from 1 to 6 times to increase the
              detail of messages sent to the log file and/or  syslog  (if
              configured).

       --devices PV
              Devices  that  the  command can use. This option can be re‐
              peated or accepts a comma separated list of  devices.  This
              overrides the devices file.

       --devicesfile String
              A  file listing devices that LVM should use.  The file must
              exist  in  /etc/lvm/devices/  and  is  managed   with   the
              lvmdevices(8)  command.  This overrides the lvm.conf(5) de‐
              vices/devicesfile and devices/use_devicesfile settings.

       --driverloaded y|n
              If set to no, the command will not attempt to  use  device-
              mapper.  For testing and debugging.

       -f|--force ...
              Override  various  checks,  confirmations  and protections.
              Use with extreme caution.

       -h|--help
              Display help text.

       --journal String
              Record information in the systemd journal.   This  informa‐
              tion  is in addition to information enabled by the lvm.conf
              log/journal setting.  command: record information about the
              command.  output: record the default command  output.   de‐
              bug: record full command debugging.

       --labelsector Number
              By  default  the  PV is labelled with an LVM2 identifier in
              its second sector (sector 1). This lets you use a different
              sector near the start of the disk (between 0 and  3  inclu‐
              sive  -  see  LABEL_SCAN_SECTORS  in  the source). Use with
              care.

       --lockopt String
              Used to pass options for special cases  to  lvmlockd.   See
              lvmlockd(8) for more information.

       --locktype sanlock|dlm|none
              Specify  the  VG  lock  type  directly  in  place  of using
              --shared.  See lvmlockd(8) for more information.

       --longhelp
              Display long help text.

       -l|--maxlogicalvolumes Number
              Sets the maximum number of LVs allowed in a VG.

       -p|--maxphysicalvolumes Number
              Sets the maximum number of PVs that can belong to  the  VG.
              The  value  0 removes any limitation.  For large numbers of
              PVs, also see options --pvmetadatacopies, and --vgmetadata‐
              copies for improving performance.

       --metadataprofile String
              The metadata profile to use for command configuration.  See
              lvm.conf(5) for more information about profiles.

       --metadatasize Size[m|UNIT]
              The approximate amount of space used for each  VG  metadata
              area.  The size may be rounded.

       -M|--metadatatype lvm2
              Specifies  the  type  of on-disk metadata to use.  lvm2 (or
              just 2) is the current, standard format.  lvm1 (or just  1)
              is no longer used.

       --nohints
              Do not use the hints file to locate devices for PVs. A com‐
              mand  may  read more devices to find PVs when hints are not
              used. The command will still perform standard hint file in‐
              validation where appropriate.

       --nolocking
              Disable locking.

       -s|--physicalextentsize Size[m|UNIT]
              Sets the physical extent size of PVs in the VG.  The  value
              must be either a power of 2 of at least 1 sector (where the
              sector size is the largest sector size of the PVs currently
              used  in  the VG), or at least 128KiB.  Once this value has
              been set, it is difficult to change without recreating  the
              VG, unless no extents need moving.

       --profile String
              An alias for --commandprofile or --metadataprofile, depend‐
              ing on the command.

       --pvmetadatacopies 0|1|2
              The number of metadata areas to set aside on a PV for stor‐
              ing  VG  metadata.   When 2, one copy of the VG metadata is
              stored at the front of the PV and a second copy  is  stored
              at  the end.  When 1, one copy of the VG metadata is stored
              at the front of the PV.  When 0, no copies of the VG  meta‐
              data are stored on the given PV.  This may be useful in VGs
              containing many PVs (this places limitations on the ability
              to use vgsplit later.)

       -q|--quiet ...
              Suppress  output  and  log  messages. Overrides --debug and
              --verbose.  Repeat once to also suppress any  prompts  with
              answer 'no'.

       --reportformat basic|json
              Overrides  current  output  format for reports which is de‐
              fined  globally  by  the  report/output_format  setting  in
              lvm.conf(5).  basic is the original format with columns and
              rows.   If  there is more than one report per command, each
              report is prefixed with the report name for identification.
              json  produces  report   output   in   JSON   format.   See
              lvmreport(7) for more information.

       --setautoactivation y|n
              Set the autoactivation property on a VG or LV.  Display the
              property with vgs or lvs "-o autoactivation".  When the au‐
              toactivation property is disabled, the VG or LV will not be
              activated  by  a  command  doing  autoactivation (vgchange,
              lvchange, or pvscan using -aay.)  If autoactivation is dis‐
              abled on a VG, no LVs will be autoactivated in that VG, and
              the LV autoactivation property has no effect.  If autoacti‐
              vation is enabled on a VG, autoactivation can  be  disabled
              for individual LVs.

       --shared
              Create  a  shared VG using lvmlockd if LVM is compiled with
              lockd support.  lvmlockd will select lock type  sanlock  or
              dlm depending on which lock manager is running. This allows
              multiple  hosts  to  share a VG on shared devices. lvmlockd
              and a lock manager must be  configured  and  running.   See
              lvmlockd(8) for more information about shared VGs.

       --systemid String
              Specifies  the  system ID that will be given to the new VG,
              overriding the system ID of the host running the command. A
              VG is normally created without this option, in  which  case
              the  new VG is given the system ID of the host creating it.
              Using this option requires caution because the system ID of
              the new VG may not match the system ID of the host  running
              the  command, leaving the VG inaccessible to the host.  See
              lvmsystemid(7) for more information.

       -t|--test
              Run in test mode. Commands will not update metadata.   This
              is implemented by disabling all metadata writing but never‐
              theless returning success to the calling function. This may
              lead to unusual error messages in multi-stage operations if
              a  tool  relies  on  reading  back metadata it believes has
              changed but hasn't.

       -v|--verbose ...
              Set verbose level. Repeat from 1 to 4 times to increase the
              detail of messages sent to stdout and stderr.

       --version
              Display version information.

       --[vg]metadatacopies all|unmanaged|Number
              Number of copies of the VG  metadata  that  are  kept.   VG
              metadata  is  kept  in  VG metadata areas on PVs in the VG,
              i.e. reserved space at the start and/or  end  of  the  PVs.
              Keeping  a  copy  of the VG metadata on every PV can reduce
              performance in VGs containing a large number of PVs.   When
              this  number is set to a non-zero value, LVM will automati‐
              cally choose PVs on which  to  store  metadata,  using  the
              metadataignore  flags  on PVs to achieve the specified num‐
              ber.  The number can also be replaced with  special  string
              values:  unmanaged  causes  LVM to not automatically manage
              the PV metadataignore flags.  all causes LVM to first clear
              the metadataignore flags on all PVs, and then to become un‐
              managed.

       -y|--yes
              Do not prompt for confirmation interactively but always as‐
              sume the answer yes. Use with extreme caution.  (For  auto‐
              matic no, see -qq.)

       -Z|--zero y|n
              Controls  if the first 4 sectors (2048 bytes) of the device
              are wiped.  The default is to wipe these sectors unless ei‐
              ther or both of --restorefile or --uuid are specified.

VARIABLES         top

       VG     Volume Group name.  See lvm(8) for valid names.

       PV     Physical Volume name, a device path under /dev.  For com‐
              mands managing physical extents, a PV positional arg gener‐
              ally accepts a suffix indicating a range (or multiple
              ranges) of physical extents (PEs). When the first PE is
              omitted, it defaults to the start of the device, and when
              the last PE is omitted it defaults to end.  Start and end
              range (inclusive): PV[:PE-PE]...  Start and length range
              (counting from 0): PV[:PE+PE]...

       String See the option description for information about the string
              content.

       Size[UNIT]
              Size is an input number that accepts an optional unit.  In‐
              put units are always treated as base two values, regardless
              of capitalization, e.g. 'k' and 'K' both refer to 1024.
              The default input unit is specified by letter, followed by
              |UNIT.  UNIT represents other possible input units: b|B is
              bytes, s|S is sectors of 512 bytes, k|K is KiB, m|M is MiB,
              g|G is GiB, t|T is TiB, p|P is PiB, e|E is EiB.  (This
              should not be confused with the output control --units,
              where capital letters mean multiple of 1000.)

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES         top

       See lvm(8) for information about environment variables used by
       lvm.  For example, LVM_VG_NAME can generally be substituted for a
       required VG parameter.

EXAMPLES         top

       Create a VG with two PVs, using the default physical extent size.
       vgcreate myvg /dev/sdk1 /dev/sdl1

SEE ALSO         top

       lvm(8), lvm.conf(5), lvmconfig(8), lvmdevices(8),

       pvchange(8), pvck(8), pvcreate(8), pvdisplay(8), pvmove(8),
       pvremove(8), pvresize(8), pvs(8), pvscan(8),

       vgcfgbackup(8), vgcfgrestore(8), vgchange(8), vgck(8),
       vgcreate(8), vgconvert(8), vgdisplay(8), vgexport(8), vgextend(8),
       vgimport(8), vgimportclone(8), vgimportdevices(8), vgmerge(8),
       vgmknodes(8), vgreduce(8), vgremove(8), vgrename(8), vgs(8),
       vgscan(8), vgsplit(8),

       lvcreate(8), lvchange(8), lvconvert(8), lvdisplay(8), lvextend(8),
       lvreduce(8), lvremove(8), lvrename(8), lvresize(8), lvs(8),
       lvscan(8),

       lvm-fullreport(8), lvm-lvpoll(8), blkdeactivate(8), lvmdump(8),

       dmeventd(8), lvmpolld(8), lvmlockd(8), lvmlockctl(8), cmirrord(8),
       lvmdbusd(8), fsadm(8),

       lvmsystemid(7), lvmreport(7), lvmcache(7), lvmraid(7), lvmthin(7),
       lvmvdo(7), lvmautoactivation(7)

COLOPHON         top

       This page is part of the lvm2 (Logical Volume Manager 2) project.
       Information about the project can be found at 
       ⟨http://www.sourceware.org/lvm2/⟩.  If you have a bug report for
       this manual page, see ⟨https://github.com/lvmteam/lvm2/issues⟩.
       This page was obtained from the project's upstream Git repository
       ⟨git://sourceware.org/git/lvm2.git⟩ on 2025-02-02.  (At that time,
       the date of the most recent commit that was found in the
       repository was 2025-01-31.)  If you discover any rendering
       problems in this HTML version of the page, or you believe there is
       a better or more up-to-date source for the page, or you have
       corrections or improvements to the information in this COLOPHON
       (which is not part of the original manual page), send a mail to
       man-pages@man7.org

Red Hat, Inc.     LVM TOOLS 2.03.31(2)-git (2025-01-14)       VGCREATE(8)

Pages that refer to this page: lvmsystemid(7)lvchange(8)lvconvert(8)lvcreate(8)lvdisplay(8)lvextend(8)lvm(8)lvmconfig(8)lvmdevices(8)lvmdiskscan(8)lvm-fullreport(8)lvm-lvpoll(8)lvreduce(8)lvremove(8)lvrename(8)lvresize(8)lvs(8)lvscan(8)pvchange(8)pvck(8)pvcreate(8)pvdisplay(8)pvmove(8)pvremove(8)pvresize(8)pvs(8)pvscan(8)vgcfgbackup(8)vgcfgrestore(8)vgchange(8)vgck(8)vgconvert(8)vgcreate(8)vgdisplay(8)vgexport(8)vgextend(8)vgimport(8)vgimportclone(8)vgimportdevices(8)vgmerge(8)vgmknodes(8)vgreduce(8)vgremove(8)vgrename(8)vgs(8)vgscan(8)vgsplit(8)