Renaming a virtual machine using the vSphere Client only changes the display name, not the corresponding files on the datastore. It may be useful to also rename the files of virtual machines to maintain consistency.

A virtual machine's files can be renamed during a disk migration operation, such as Storage Migration, Storage vMotion or by manually renaming them in-place from the ESXi Shell. Select your preferred method.
 

Renaming virtual machine files using Storage vMotion

A virtual machine's files can be renamed on the fly during a Storage vMotion initiated from the vSphere Client. The renaming occurs with no downtime.

1. Log in to the vCenter web client.
2. Locate the virtual machine in your host inventory.
3. Right-click the virtual machine and click Rename.
4. Change the virtual machine name as required.
5. Begin a Storage vMotion or an offline Storage Migration of the virtual machine. For more information, see:

• ESXi 6.x: Migration with Storage vMotion
• ESXi 7.0 .x: Migration with Storage vMotion

 

• The Storage vMotion only changes the name of the virtual machine files when the destination datastore is different from the original.
• After the migration completes, the virtual machine files match the virtual machine name configured in step 4.
• If a virtual machine directory already exists on the datastore with the same name, then the target virtual machine is placed in a new directory with _1 appended.
• Changing the name does not change the name of any virtual machine files or the name of the directory that the files are located in.
• Migration with Storage vMotion changes the virtual machine filenames on the destination datastore to match the inventory name of the virtual machine. The migration renames all virtual disk, configuration, snapshot, and .nvram files. If the new names exceed the maximum filename length, the migration does not succeed.

 

Renaming virtual machine files in-place using the console

 Warning: Before proceeding, ensure that:

• The virtual machine has a current backup and that it has been powered down.
• The virtual machine does not have snapshots or virtual disks shared with other virtual machines.

To manually rename files of the virtual machine:

1. Log in to the vCenter web client.
2. Locate the virtual machine in your host inventory.
3. Power down the virtual machine
4. Right-click on the virtual machine and click Remove from inventory.
5. Open SSH session to the ESXi/ESX host.
6. Navigate to the directory containing the virtual machine.

7. Rename the virtual disk (VMDK) files using the vmkfstools -E command:

• In some cases, it may be required to clone (copy) a virtual disk. To clone a virtual disk to a new virtual disk, run this command:

• You need not rename the originalname-flat.vmdk file after running the vmkfstools command. The vmkfstools command renames both VMDK files and updates the reference within the descriptor.
• Do not use the cp or mv commands to rename virtual disk files. Instead, use VMware utilities such as vmkfstools.

8. Copy the virtual machine configuration file (.vmx) using the command:

9. Open the file new virtual machine configuration (for example, newname.vmx) in a text editor.

10. Within the configuration file, modify all old instances of the virtual machine's file names to the new file names. At a minimum, modify these values (more may exist):

11. Correct any other remaining lines referencing the original path or file names.
12. Save the file and exit the editor.
13. Rename all the remaining files, except the .vmx configuration file, to the new names.

14. Change directory to the parent directory:

15. Rename the directory for the virtual machine:

16. Using the VMware vSphere Client, browse the datastore and navigate to the renamed virtual machine directory.
17. Right-click the virtual machine's new configuration file (for example, newname.vmx) and select Add to inventory.

18. Power on the virtual machine.
19. A question for the virtual machine displays in the Summary tab during power-on. To review the question:
    1. Click the Summary tab.
    2. Right-click the virtual machine in your inventory and select Answer question.
    3. When prompted, select I moved it, then click OK.

20. Optionally delete the original virtual machine configuration file.

The CLI on ESX is case-sensitive and requires escaping of special characters used in some virtual machine file names. The examples above encourage the use of quotation marks around command arguments to ensure spaces and special characters are interpreted literally and do not require escape sequences.

For example, a virtual machine named "Original VM" is referenced either as "Original VM" (with quotation marks) or Original\ VM.

Special characters, such as opening and closing parentheses, also require character escaping. A virtual machine named "Original VM (1)" is referenced either as "Original VM (1)" (with quotation marks) or Original\ VM\ \(1\).

The former quotation method simplifies the process considerably and improves readability.

Additional information on escape characters can be found in the Bash Reference Manual.

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Renaming a virtual machine disk (VMDK) via the vSphere Management Assistant (vMA) or vSphere CLI (vCLI)