Guides - View, Create, and Delete Block Storage Volumes

The Block Storage service allows you create Volumes, which can be attached to Compute Instances and used to store your data. This guide covers how to view, add, and delete these Volumes.

Log in to the Cloud Manager and click the Volumes link in the sidebar. All Volumes on your account are listed here, along with the region, size, and their attachment status.

1. Log in to the Cloud Manager and click the Linodes link in the sidebar.

2. Select the Compute Instance for which you’d like to view all attached Volumes. The detail page for that instance should appear.

3. Navigate to the Storage tab and find the Volumes section, as shown below. All Volumes that are currently attached to this Compute Instance should appear in a list, along with the region, size, and the file system path.

Note

If the Linode’s data center has been upgraded to NVMe Block Storage and your Linode was deployed prior to August 24th, 2021, you may need to reboot your Linode for it to properly work with a NVMe Block Storage Volume.

1. Navigate to the Volumes page in the Cloud Manager. Alternatively, if you know which Compute Instance you wish to attach the new Volume to, navigate to the Storage tab for that instance. See View Volumes.

2. Click the Create Volume button to open the creation form. This form may have slightly different options, depending on the page you were on in the previous step. If creating a Volume directly from a Compute Instance’s Storage tab, select Create and Attach Volume to create a new Volume.

3. Enter the Label and Size of the Volume.

   • Label: A string up to 32 characters long and consisting only of ASCII characters a-z; 0-9.-_.
   • Size: The desired size for the new Volume. See the Limits and Considerations section for the minimum and maximum size.

4. Select the Region and Linode. These fields only appear when creating a Volume from the main Volume page (not on a specific Compute Instance). If the Linode field is left blank, the Volume is created in a detached state, meaning it is not attached to any Compute Instance.

5. If a Compute Instance has been selected, select a Configuration Profile within the Config field to attach the Volume to the next available Block Device Assignment (such as /dev/sdc).

6. Click Create Volume to create the new Block Storage Volume.

7. A Volume Configuration panel appears, which contains the instructions needed to start using the new Volume with your Compute Instance. These instructions include commands for creating the file system, mounting the Volume, and configuring your instance to automatically mount the Volume at boot. To learn more about these commands, see Configuring and Mounting a Volume.

8. Once created, the Volume is listed under the Volumes table.

Caution

Once a Block Storage Volume has been deleted, the data contained on that Volume will be permanently erased. This action cannot be reversed.

1. Log in to the Cloud Manager.

2. If the Volume is attached to a Compute Instance, power off that instance and detach the Volume. To do so, follow the instructions within the Detach the Volume guide.

3. Click on the Volumes link in the sidebar.

4. Locate the desired Volume within the list, click the more options ellipsis dropdown menu, and select Delete.

5. In the configuration dialog, click Delete once again.