How to PROPERLY use lvextend to increase LV size

Introduction to lvextend command

lvextend command extends the size of a logical volume in Linux. Sometimes, your LVM partition might be running out of space and you need to increase the size of it. That's where lvextend becomes very useful.

 

Are you new to LVM and still learning how it works?

We have written detailed articles covering different areas of managing logical volumes, which you can follow using the below links:

Manage Logical Volume in Linux - One STOP Solution
Understand LVM Architecture
Create LVM during installation RHEL/CentOS 7/8
How to use LVM Snapshot for Backup and Restore
Create Mirrored Logical Volume
Create Striped Logical Volume

 

Do I need to reboot to extend my root or data logical volume?

NO, you don't need to reboot or go into single user mode or resuce mode. You can perform a LIVE expansion of root or any other data logical volume without having to reboot your system

 

Pre-requisites before you plan logical volume size expansion

Your volume group must have enough free space to increase logical volume size

You must have root level access to the server

Take backup of the respective partition. Be prepared for the worst - always.

 

 

Different examples to use lvextend command

The syntax for lvextend command is as follows:

# lvextend option LV_path

To use lvextend command, you should already have created a logical volume on your system. You can run lvs command to list the logical volumes.

If there is no output, you can use lvcreate command to create a new logical volume in the volume group. For detailed instructions, see 10+ lvcreate command examples in Linux [Cheat Sheet].

It is necessary to know the free space in the volume group so, you can extend the size of the logical volume accordingly. You can view the information about volume group using vgs or vgdisplay command.

root@ubuntu-PC:~# vgs
  VG      #PV #LV #SN Attr   VSize   VFree  
  vol_grp   1   3   0 wz--n- 508.00m 356.00m

 

1. Extend the logical volume in units of megabytes

The -L or --size option of lvextend command extends the logical volume in units of megabytes. You can specify how much you want to extend the size or how large you want it to be.

For example, with + sign, the size is added to the actual size of the logical volume.

# lvextend -L +48M /dev/vol_grp/lvol

Sample Output:

Without + sign, the given size is set as the new size of the logical volume. The size should be larger than the existing size.

The following command extends the size of the logical volume lvol2 to 100M in the volume group vol_grp.

# lvextend -L 100M /dev/vol_grp/lvol2

Sample Output:

 

2. Extend the logical volume in units of logical extents

You can extend the size of the logical volume in the number of extents by using -l or --extents option.

The following command adds 10 extents to the logical volume lvol0 on the volume group vol_grp.

# lvextend -l +10 /dev/vol_grp/lvol0

OR

# lvextend --extents +10 /dev/vol_grp/lvol0

Sample Output:

Without + sign, the specified extents will be the new actual size of the logical volume.

 

3. Extend the logical volume by using a percentage as the size

The -l or --extents option also allows you to specify a percentage of the total space in the volume group with the suffix %VG.

For example, using +10%VG will extend the logical size by adding 10% of the total size of the volume group. The resulting size is rounded upward to a full physical extent.

# lvextend -l +10%VG /dev/vol_grp/lvol0

Sample Output:

 

4. Extend the logical volume using the remaining space in the volume group

You can also use -l or --extents argument to specify a percentage of the remaining free space in the volume group.

The following command extends the logical volume lvol1 by using all of the unallocated space in the volume group vol_grp.

# lvextend -l +100%FREE /dev/vol_grp/lvol1

Sample Output:

As you can see, there is no free space remaining on the volume group vol_grp.

 

How to properly extend Logical Volume? [Step-by-Step]

lvextend uses the space from the volume group and adds it to the logical volume. After extending the logical volume, it is necessary to increase the file system to match the size.

We will take you through step-by-step guides to extend the logical volume properly in Linux.

 

Step-1: Check LV and VG size

You can check the size of logical volume using the lvs command. You also have to make sure whether there is free space available in the volume group. To display volume group information, you can use vgs or vgdisplay command.

root@ubuntu-PC:~# lvs vol_grp/lvol1
  LV    VG      Attr       LSize  Pool Origin Data%  Meta%  Move Log Cpy%Sync Convert
  lvol1 vol_grp -wi-a----- 60.00m                                                    
root@ubuntu-PC:~# 
root@ubuntu-PC:~# vgs
  VG      #PV #LV #SN Attr   VSize   VFree  
  vol_grp   1   4   0 wz--n- 508.00m 328.00m

The VSize column shows the total size and the VFree shows the free space in the volume group. In the next section, we will increase the logical volume lvol1 to 200MiB. The current size of lvol1 is 60MiB.

 

Step-2: Extend the logical volume using lvextend command

The following command extends the logical volume lvol1 to 200MiB in the volume group vol_grp.

root@ubuntu-PC:~# lvextend -L 200M /dev/vol_grp/lvol1 
  Size of logical volume vol_grp/lvol1 changed from 60.00 MiB (15 extents) to 200.00 MiB (50 extents).
  Logical volume vol_grp/lvol1 successfully resized.

 

Step-3:  Resize the partition using resize2fs/xfs_growfs command

It is necessary to resize the extended partition and update the file system. You can use the resize2fs command to resize the partition for an ext3 or ext4 partition and xfs_growfs for an XFS partition.

Sometimes, you might get an error like this as I have got.

root@ubuntu-PC:~# resize2fs /dev/vol_grp/lvol1
resize2fs 1.45.5 (07-Jan-2020)
Please run 'e2fsck -f /dev/vol_grp/lvol1' first.

In that case, you need to run e2fsck -f /dev/vol_grp/lvol1 command first. It forcefully checks the filesystem for errors, even if the filesystem is clean.

root@ubuntu-PC:~# e2fsck -f /dev/vol_grp/lvol1
e2fsck 1.45.5 (07-Jan-2020)
Pass 1: Checking inodes, blocks, and sizes
Pass 2: Checking directory structure
Pass 3: Checking directory connectivity
Pass 4: Checking reference counts
Pass 5: Checking group summary information
/dev/vol_grp/lvol1: 11/15360 files (0.0% non-contiguous), 1518/15360 blocks

Then run resize2fs /dev/vol_grp/lvol.

root@ubuntu-PC:~# resize2fs /dev/vol_grp/lvol1
resize2fs 1.45.5 (07-Jan-2020)
Resizing the filesystem on /dev/vol_grp/lvol1 to 51200 (4k) blocks.
The filesystem on /dev/vol_grp/lvol1 is now 51200 (4k) blocks long.

 

Step-4: Check the logical volume size and mount it back

You can verify the extended size of the logical volume using lvs or lvdisplay command.

root@ubuntu-PC:~# lvs /dev/vol_grp/lvol1
  LV    VG      Attr       LSize   Pool Origin Data%  Meta%  Move Log Cpy%Sync Convert
  lvol1 vol_grp -wi-a----- 200.00m 

As you can see, the current size of lvol1 is 200MiB.

Now, you can mount the LV back using the mount command as shown below.

root@ubuntu-PC:~# mount /dev/vol_grp/lvol1 /test
root@ubuntu-PC:~# 
root@ubuntu-PC:~# df -h /test
Filesystem                 Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/mapper/vol_grp-lvol1  193M   52K  183M   1% /test

 

Conclusion

We hope this article gave you an idea of how to extend the logical volume size using the lvextend command. This article also shows the step-by-step instructions to extend the logical volume.

If you still have any confusion, please let us know in the comment section below.

 

What's Next

10+ lvchange command examples in Linux [Cheat Sheet]
How to PROPERLY rename Logical Volume [Step-by-Step]

 

Further Reading

man page for lvextend command
How to extend/resize Logical Volume and Volume Group in Linux