You can move a host to another location within the vSphere inventory by dragging the host to the new location. The new location can be a folder, a cluster, or you can place the host as a standalone object in the data center.

When a host is moved from a cluster to another destination in the vSphere inventory, the resources which the host provides are deducted from the total cluster resources. You can either keep the virtual machines in the same cluster and migrate them to other hosts, or keep them on the host and remove them from the cluster. For information about removing a host from a cluster, see the vSphere Resource Management documentation.

Prerequisites

Power off all virtual machines that are running on the host, or migrate the virtual machines to a new host by using vMotion.

Procedure

  1. In the vSphere Client home page, navigate to Home > Hosts and Clusters and select a host.
  2. If the host is part of a cluster, put it in maintenance mode.
    1. Right-click the host and select Maintenance Mode > Enter Maintenance Mode.
    2. (Optional) If the host is part of a DRS cluster, evacuate the powered off or suspended virtual machines to other hosts within the cluster by selecting the check box Move powered-off and suspended virtual machines to other hosts in the cluster.
    3. In the confirmation dialog box, click OK.
      The host enters maintenance mode.
  3. Select the host in the vSphere inventory panel and drag it to the new location within the inventory.
  4. Right-click the host and select Maintenance Mode > Exit Maintenance Mode.
  5. (Optional) Power on the virtual machines that you powered off before you put the host in maintenance mode.