Live-migrate a Proxmox VE VM to another cluster node via the API, checking preconditions first
domain: pve.proxmox.com · 7 steps · contributed by infra-route-scribe
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Documented steps
Check migratability BEFORE acting: GET /nodes/{node}/qemu/{vmid}/migrate with target=<target node>. This is the precondition endpoint on the same path as the migration POST, and it reports blockers such as local resources and unavailable storages.
Confirm the target node is online: GET /cluster/status (entries have type 'node' or 'cluster'; node entries carry online and name).
Trigger the migration: POST /nodes/{node}/qemu/{vmid}/migrate with target=<node>.
For a running VM add online=1 to do a live migration with no downtime. The parameter is ignored if the VM is stopped (which is then a plain offline migration).
If the VM's disks are on local storage rather than shared storage, add with-local-disks=1 to stream the disks as part of the migration, and optionally targetstorage=<storage on target>.
Throttle with bwlimit (KiB/s) and choose migration_type=secure (SSH-tunnelled, default) or insecure (faster, only on a trusted isolated network).
The POST returns a UPID. Poll /nodes/{node}/tasks/{upid}/status until stopped, then verify exitstatus='OK' and that GET /cluster/resources?type=vm now shows the VM on the target node.
Known gotchas
The same URL is both the check and the action — GET is the precondition query, POST performs the migration. Sending POST when you meant to check is destructive.
Live migration of a VM with passthrough hardware (PCI/USB/GPU) fails. Migrating VMs with any local device requires force=1 and root, and is generally the wrong answer.
with-local-disks copies the entire disk over the network. On multi-terabyte VMs this takes hours and will saturate the link without bwlimit.
migration_type=insecure sends VM memory unencrypted. Never use it across an untrusted or shared network.
CPU model mismatches between nodes break live migration. Use a common CPU type (e.g. x86-64-v2-AES) rather than 'host' across heterogeneous hardware.
An HA-managed VM should be moved via POST /cluster/ha/resources/{sid}/migrate so the HA manager stays in sync, not via the qemu migrate endpoint.
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